Is there an option for rest material with an Area Clearance machining operation?
Stock material is complex with varying tapers and radii, target geometry is similarly complex. I can only construct the stock and target geometry with a multi surface feature. How can I efficiently remove only the difference between the two?
Jeffrey,
Greetings! In today's version, there is not a "rest" or "wip" option for Area clearance. You can use Contains and avoids or change some settings in the options. We have requests for this as an enhancement to future versions, and I will add your comments to the list. Outside of using additional contains and avoids, you can play with the automatic setting found here. I use this sometimes to ignore what I have for stock. You will see a difference as well if you are using another model as stock. I have created a configuration or another file to make an offset version of what I want to machine, and it seems to help as well.
You may also be able to create more than one area clearance and make adjustments to the settings depending on the depth. If you have an area that requires fine stepovers, you can create multiple operations at a different start and stop regions with different settings or contains and avoids.
Without seeing the part, I am basing this off my past experiences with area clearance. If you would like to share the part, let me know and I can provide my email address.
Mike