OPEN MIND Gives UK Debut to 'CAD For CAM Users' Package at MACH

24 January 2014

The new advanced hyperMILL® 2013.2. CAM software from OPEN MIND has now been vastly improved in its CAD component, thanks to the new hyperCAD®-S platform. The new hyperCAD-S will show how it can improve processing speeds and user work flow at MACH 2014 on Stand 5341. In hyperCAD®-S, OPEN MIND has developed its own CAD system that is ideally matched to the CAM system hyperMILL®. This CAD solution is specifically designed to address the requirements of NC programmers. In Version 2013.2, hyperCAD®-S has been improved in a number of ways.

Tool and mould making, in particular, is always associated with geometries from a variety of sources. To import these reliably, hyperCAD®-S incorporates a series of first-rate interfaces. The interfaces have now been enhanced for the import of 2D entities, 3D meshes and dimensions as vector graphics by adding a DXF/DWG interface. This allows for layers, colours, line types and work-planes to be imported, provided they were defined in the origin system.

If the parts are stored in hyperCAD®-S, they can be analysed thoroughly. A new feature with this product is the recognition of double entities. Regardless of whether this involves curves or faces, as soon as they occur twice, they will be recognised and displayed. First, the component is displayed as transparent; the double parts found are then highlighted in the selection colour. This provides a quick overview, as Wolfgang Weiss, product manager for hyperCAD®-S at OPEN MIND explains: “The advantage of this new function is the reliable removal of double entities already in the CAD part of the system, which saves a lot of time during CAM programming.”

It is also helpful to now have the option to reverse a current selection. Through the inversion, the user can quickly isolate certain entities by selecting, inverting and rendering invisible surrounding entities. What remains are the entities of interest.

Editing parts
CAM users too must be able to make constructive changes to imported parts to some degree, to prepare them optimally for NC machining. This often includes the filleting of faces. Using hyperMILL® 2013.2, it is now possible to generate constant fillet faces between two faces or tangential chains that are trimmed and extended automatically. Advanced edge curve recognition has also been added. This is a fully integrated function that substantially facilitates the user’s work. The new command creates the topology of the faces, ‘sews’ them together and generates a clean edge boundary.

Finally, OPEN MIND has developed a new data format for hyperCAD®-S, ‘hyperMILL® CAD Template’ (hmct). This allows users to create, save and re-use templates in a meaningful manner. This innovative new 'CAD for CAM users' solution will be introduced at MACH with extensive demonstrations available from the OPEN MIND UK technical team.