CGTech VERICUT user exchange event held in UK

CGTech used the event to explain to customers what enhancements are planned for the next release of Vericut, the world's most advanced independent CNC machine tool simulation and optimisation software. Feedback was also gathered at the event, to help CGTech's software development team focus attention on areas that customers actually request. John Reed, CGTech managing director, explained first the latest release of VERICUT: "For VERICUT 7.2, we continue to focus on the customers' use of VERICUT and improving the simulation process speed and effectiveness. We added features to the user interface to simplify the most common user actions and invested significant developer effort to increase speed by more thoroughly taking advantage of multiple processors and background processing. The result is that VERICUT 7.2 is significantly faster than previous versions with no compromise on accuracy." Following, Christian Wissing Kruse, project manager with LEGO Engineering, Prototypes & Tooling, explained how the iconic toymaker has been using VERICUT to support the company's production of complex moulds and dies, reducing the daily risk of a costly and damaging collision between a machine tool spindle and the tool material. "With the traditional simulation that many CAM packages are capable of, there are certain parameters that you cannot take into consideration. Often the programs do not consider the individual CNC machine's kinematic properties and most programs simulate internal CAM movements and not post-processed data. These shortcomings can be fatal if, for example, you plan to operate with the machine's spindle in close proximity to the workpiece." Mr Kruse stated how the company simulates and achieves a 2 micron tolerance on its mould tools. "We have measured our CNC machines, so Vericut knows them inside and out. When the final NC program has been written, we send it to a shortcut on the PC's desktop from where a simulation is conducted on a dedicated PC-server through a system of Windows batch-scripts and VB-scripts. We do not need to watch the program as it is simulated and when the simulation is complete, an email message is sent to the relevant person with a green 'go-ahead' or red 'stop' in the message field." During the afternoon, guests were taken through a list of productivity enhancing 'tips and tricks' for the current version of VERICUT by the company's technical staff. This proved popular, it is reported, and sparked further positive feedback on more areas for the development engineers to work on.