Rout Tool VERY slow in 1.187, better in newer versions?

[brdad]

Based on my experiences, the final run time is affected by the amount of lag the operator (me) has in answering prompts, jogging etc. The same file can have as much as a 10 minute variation. (I paused one carve for 3 hrs while I went to dinner and that was reflected in the run time).

This particular project is one bit, so that lessens that issue. And 10 minutes is generally no big deal, but 2.75 hours added onto a 2 hour project is quite undesirable!

[brdad]

Here are the changes.

Panel Size: 36" X 12.1
Carve Time: ~1 Hour 19 Minutes

Interesting. So, again adding time for coffee breaks, which adds up to about 1:15, total of 2:34, that should carve faster than what I am doing.

Even more interesting is that I am able to open, save, and re-open that file without designer crashing.

[bergerud]

Well I just ran the square foot of bricks. It was supposed to take 19 minutes but it actually took 26 minutes. A little pause at each corner must add up to the difference.

I still like the single vector idea, even if the time savings is not so great. It cut like a carving carves. Slowly proceeding forward in the x as the y goes back and forth. I like to see each section get completed as the board moves slowly through as opposed having the board and truck jumping around.

[SteveNelson46]

I fixed my previous file. I had forgotten to offset every other row.

[brdad]

Well I just ran the square foot of bricks. It was supposed to take 19 minutes but it actually took 26 minutes. A little pause at each corner must add up to the difference.

I still like the single vector idea, even if the time savings is not so great. It cut like a carving carves. Slowly proceeding forward in the x as the y goes back and forth. I like to see each section get completed as the board moves slowly through as opposed having the board and truck jumping around.

I tend to agree, for speed minimizing the pauses makes a big difference, and it appears all or most objects create a pause afterward. Added bonus is a little less wear on the machine. The downside of a single vector is it makes it a little harder to make adjustments (which might be less hassle with the newer software).

I think on my next sections I am going to try a combination. I will try the horizontal lines individually and drop down and back up as I go to create the vertical lines. So one vector effectively does the upper lines of one row of bricks. That is backwards as you suggest, but from my calculation it results in similar X movement overall (288" vs. 281"). It will take a break at each row, but 54 rows is less than 2 minutes added time IF the pause is 2 seconds.

We shall see, it can't be any worse than using the rout tool. I'm on my last large piece, so I'll be trying that tomorrow.

[brdad]

Well, I'm back to doing things the way I started.

Trying the horizontal lines individually was a fail. Instead of routing down to the end, then routing back up, the machine decided to do all the routs from left to right. This resulted in a tracking innacuracy that made every row about 1/16" offset to the right compared to the one before. Not really surprising on a 3 foot long board.

So I decided to hich all those horizontal individual lines together. Despite being a few years old I think my computer is fairly capable, but designer just wanted no part of that. It crashed a few times, and after I finally suceeded, I ended up with many dimensional vertex errors so I gave that up.

So, starting from scratch I decided to try and make individual vertical rows, like bergerud's but broken up into vertical sections. That seemed to work without crashing Designer, so I connected them together as one line and that seemed ok as well. I was going to try a section like this, but on upload it calculated a carve time of 3:44 for the individual vertical rows and 3:42 for all one vector. While either of these methods may work, it's clear it really won't save a lot of time. I predict an actually carve time of 4 hours on thse slightly shorter walls, so even if the other methods were calculated accurately we're only talking 15 minutes. I'm thinking I'm safer sticking with what I know works. Sometimes we just have to accept there is no "best" way to do something.

[cestout]

Too b ad you don't have version 3. You could make the vertical lines into a pattern and do the horizontal lines as vector. Horizontal tracking would not be a problem that way.
Clint

[brdad]

Too b ad you don't have version 3. You could make the vertical lines into a pattern and do the horizontal lines as vector. Horizontal tracking would not be a problem that way.
Clint

You can make vectors into a pattern in 1.187 as well, and I thought about doing that. I posted a sample in post #15 above, but didn't test it, mainly because I feared there would be a difference in depth or some other issues going that route. On the preview window it should up different, despite being the same bit and the same depth, not that that is an idication it'd carve different.

[SteveNelson46]

In all of the years that I have had a Carvewright I have never successfully used the rout tool. It's primarily used to rout a perimeter around the outside edge of a board and routing an edge on the router table is much faster and cleaner with fewer problems. I think what you really need to do is to draw your vectors, assign a bit and set a depth. Just about any bit can be assigned to any depth. You can even use the profile tool to get different profiles along the vector or at each end but the rout tool will give you nothing but problems and most experienced users don't use it. Just passing along my own experiences..

[bergerud]

Actually, the route tool is something else altogether. It is the strangest tool that no one ever uses. You can assign different bits to different pieces of a vector. Not the friendliest tool either.