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Best Software to use to Program 7-Axis Robot

thinktankgroup

Plastic
Joined
Jul 7, 2017
Hey everyone!

We just purchased a 7-Axis Robot and have been using Powermill as our main software for programming, but we're not sure if it's the best choice for us just yet.

I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations or preferences for programming software for 7-axis machines.

Some questions we have...
- What CAM software that's currently out there seems like it has the brightest future in this space? (Mastercam, Powermill, Solidcam, Octopuz, etc.)
- If you were to purchase a new CAM software, which one would you invest in?

Thanks in advance for any tips!! Appreciate it.
 
What robot is it? A lot will depend on what you're going to do as far as material removal, profiles, machining tool paths, etc....Take a look at RoboDK depending on the 7th axis - if it's a standard Fanuc / Motoman / ABB with an aux axis RoboDK will be fine. I've had issues running a 3-axis positioner in RoboDK - it doesn't understand the 3rd axis but I am working with them to get that taken care of... For most of my offline programming I use Fanuc Roboguide since we're Fanuc integrators...but - it doesn't have any milling toolpaths.

I've been running a SolidCAM demo and don't recall seeing anything for robot posts...

No experience with the others. I know NX also has one, and there's RobotMaster that runs inside MasterCAM.. Those are huge investments. I believe Powermill for robots is like 9 grand a year subscription...

If it's a Fanuc you'll need Ascii upload option. Also keep in mind you'll be limited to x-amount of lines of code in a Fanuc. These offline programming guys need to find a way to drip feed a Fanuc robot. We've toyed with it and have had success but you have to use the RS232 port in conjunction with an FTP connection - it's really kind of rube goldberg at that point....

Again it all depends on what you're going to do with it.
 








 
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