Cutting plan and DXF sheet nesting

Intro

This video covers the fabrication section: weight and bill of materials, the cutting plan for bars and sections, and sheet nesting from DXF files.

Weight and bill of materials

Open Fabrication in the main menu. The first tab is weight and bill of materials. It has its own video, so here is just a quick look.

Cutting plan

The cutting plan finds the fewest stock bars and the least waste. Enter the parts to cut, with section, mark, length and quantity, or load them from Excel. Here we keep the sample data. Below, enter the stock lengths you have, the saw kerf, the trim cut at each end, and from which length an offcut is still usable. The result shows the material utilisation, how many bars of each section you need, and a cutting diagram for every bar. Save it as a PDF for the saw, or add the stock bars straight to the bill of materials.

Sheet nesting

Sheet nesting places your parts on standard sheets. Load one or more DXF files. Every closed outline becomes a part, with its holes. Set the quantities. Simple rectangular plates can be added without a drawing. Enter the sheet size, the gap between parts and the edge margin, choose whether parts may be rotated, and calculate. You see the material utilisation, the number of sheets, the weight of parts and scrap, and every sheet layout. Each sheet can be saved as DXF for the cutting machine, and the whole plan as a PDF.

Try it

That's the fabrication section. Try it for free at benchmaths.com.