PRIME MOTION3D strategies
3D operations move the tool in X, Y and Z together to follow a shaped surface: a carved bowl, a relief, a contoured seat. They work in two stages. A clearing operation removes the bulk with a flat end mill, leaving a little stock; a finishing operation then follows the surface with a ball end mill. Long-press 3D in the rail to choose one.
Every 3D operation picks a Body on Drive body (Tap the body to machine — the whole surface is the drive surface). The shared pages are in Operation settings.
Clearing
| Rail entry (drawer title) | Suits |
|---|---|
| 3D Adaptive Clearing (Adaptive Clearing) | Removing a lot of material fast with a steady tool load |
| 3D Pocket Clearing (Pocket Clearing) | Clearing level by level with a constant stepover |
Both clear from the Tool Run's stock and need one: No stock is defined for this tool run — 3D clearing needs a stock model to clear from.
Finishing
| Operation | Passes | Suits |
|---|---|---|
| Parallel | Straight lines at a Pass direction angle | Gentle slopes; the general-purpose finish |
| Scallop | Offsets inward or outward at an even spacing | An even finish over mixed slopes |
| 3D Contour | Level by level around the walls | Steep walls |
| Ramp | Down the walls in a continuous ramp | Steep walls without level steps |
| Horizontal | Only the flat areas | Flat floors and terraces |
| Pencil | Along inside corners | Cleaning fillets a larger tool could not reach |
| Spiral | A spiral from a centre | Round, domed shapes |
| Radial | Spokes from a centre | Round shapes, turned-looking finishes |
| Morphed Spiral | A spiral that follows the boundary's shape | Pockets and recesses with rounded shapes |
| Project | Patterns from picked Curve Edges, projected onto the surface | Decorative patterns |
| Blend | Passes blended between two picked edges | Surfaces between two edges |
| Morph | Passes morphed between picked edges | Surfaces between two edges |
| Flow | Along the U or V direction of picked faces (Surface Faces) | Single smooth faces |
| 3D Trace | Along picked sketch curves or edges | Engraving on a curved surface |
Flat and Geodesic are listed as Not built yet.
What 3D adds
| Setting | Use |
|---|---|
| Machining boundary | Limit the toolpath to the model's Silhouette, a Bounding box, or picked faces (Selection), with the tool Inside, On boundary or Outside |
| Milling direction | Both, Up milling or Down milling |
| Avoid / machine surfaces | Add exceptions: faces to Machine, Avoid, Ignore, or keep clear of as Fixture |
| Rest machining | Cut only what an earlier operation or tool left. Source: Previous operations, Previous tool, File, Bodies or Setup stock |
| Z levels | Stepdown for the level-based operations |
| Linking | How passes join, and holder and shaft collision checks |
An Issues page appears when something is set that will not work as expected, such as a boundary set to Selection with nothing picked.
Refusals
| Message | What it means |
|---|---|
| The Ø‹d› ball cannot conform to this face — ball radius ‹r› mm exceeds the face's tightest concave radius ‹t› mm… | The ball is too big for the tightest curve; use a smaller ball |
| Rest machining from previous operations is not available yet… | Set the rest source to Setup stock to clear the whole block |
| Rest machining source "Previous tool" has no stock model behind it for 3D clearing — use "Setup stock". | Choose Setup stock. A previous tool's diameter alone does not supply remaining stock for 3D clearing |
| Maximum stepdown must be greater than zero (Passes tab) | Set a stepdown |
| Optimal load must be greater than zero (Passes tab) | Set the load |