Gcodetools - Inkscape's CAM extension

Just edited post #24371 after more tests.

EDIT: Too weird... I just redid a few things in your code and now .NCD works but .nc doesn't.

Here's what I did:
I just changed the file types and put "Sources" in the _section since I saw other languages had Sources instead of Other.

I don't think changing "Other" to "Sources" did anything. But not sure there. Haven't tested it.


EDIT2: Some .nc files open as Plain Text and others as GCode. If I save one as GCode language it will later open with GCode.

Hmmm... I'm totally confused.

If we
Create new file + save as ngc = Text file
Create new file + save file as .nc + save as ngc = Gcode languge
Create new file + save file as .c it becomes C + save as ngc = Gcode languge

It appears that it wont change file parsing type only if saving from the text file...

In GEdit Is there a way to do math operations to say ALL Z-axis coordinates?

in other words shift all of the Z's up by a set amount?

I'm afraid no.

But you can use Regular expression extension for that.

for example, change
Z([\-\d\.\s]+)
to
Z[#<zoffset>+[\1]]

and define #<zoffset> = 10 at the top.

Or you can use parameterize Gcode postprocessor from Gcodetools to add this parameters to Gcode automaticaly.

I'm having a problem with area fill. I can get the area filled in properly with the Area tool, and the drawing looks correct. When I generate the gcode, it still looks good in inkscape, but in the actual .ncg file, some paths are repeated over and over - 55 times in the attached file!

I've been deiting the duplicate paths out with Gedit, but that's tedious and unnecessary. Any ideas what I might be doing wrong?

Walt

Did you fill the area with Offsets of the original path?
You should define correct "path width" Gcodetools adds (path width)/(tool diameter) paths with dinamyc offset. In fact this function is not the best choise. You can try Fill area with Zig-Zag or Spiral from Dev version, usualy it works better.

Offsets of the path is a quite complex task and some times some bugs appear. Even poverful CADs have problems with offsets, I saw bugs in Rhinoceros after offsetting paths.

Thanks, Nick.
I tried Spiral, and it worked well, but with a lot of wasted motion going back to the start of a cut for a second pass (to reach final cut depth). I'll try Zig-Zag next, that might yield better results.

You mention a Dev version. I'm using 1.7 which I thought was the latest released version, although it differs significantly from the tutorials. As I gain more experience I hope to be able to help with writing/editing the tutorials. Should I be using an earlier version? I'm an old hand at computers in general but this is my first venture into CAD/CAM.

Thank you for a wonderful piece of software

Walt

Yes 1.7 is the latest released version. But we have improved version that is in the development. We just have no time to make a new release.

You can find dev version in the bazaar repository bazaar.launchpad.net/~gcodetools.team/gcodetools/develope/files
then create inx files by
python create_inx.py
and install the extension as usual.

Dev version has some new features and bug fixes.