Software Streamlines Machine Programming

Autodesk’s FeatureCAM 2019 is designed so that instead of having to program a machine stage by stage, the operator can program it using everyday shop terms, such as ‘turn’, ‘bore’, ‘bolt’, etc. The software is said to have sufficient intelligence to recognize needs and requirements from such terms and will automatically adopt the right speed and torque strengths without having to be instructed line by line.

New in FeatureCAM 2019 is the Directed Automated Feature Recognition (DAFR) capability, which automatically recognizes holes, bosses, sides and pockets in a single workflow, which enables faster programming. While standard AFR slices the model in the active Z axis and produces complete features as it makes its way down the model, DAFR allows the user to select the features they want even before recognition begins.