CAM in Fusion with chain ring

I modeled a chain guard to fit my chain ring in Fusion. The guard I printed and works well, at least keeps my pant leg out of the chain. After using the dimensions from the chain ring for the guard I continued with the ring and modeled the teeth profile. I am just getting a router up and running and was trying to get this chain ring setup in CAM as a exercise to get familiar with it. Anyone using CAM in Fusion? I will post a sharable link.

I use CAM in Fusion often. I’m not sure what your question is, is it how to get started?

Quick steps:

  • switch to manufacture mode
  • create setup. This is also where you set your raw material sizes
  • Create ops. You probably want to start with 2d adaptive clearing.

The default speeds and feeds in the tool library are probably not right for your machine. To keep things sane on your first project you can set them in each op. Eventually you’ll want to create a tool library with settings that make sense for your machine.

Match tool numbers in Fusion and your CNC software.

I missed the 2d contour silhouette, that gets me the outer profile. The rest I think I can figure out. Not really planning to mill this but was just seeing if I could do a realistic toll path strategy. I am limited to a 1/4" endmill because of inner tooth radius, and have a 4kw 18000rpm spindle. What would you consider a realistic feed rate and depth of cut in aluminum? The other feature is the chamfer which I think could be done with a ball end mill after a roughing cut with end mill. May see if I can do this in MDF to see how it looks.

FSWizard is a pretty good free speed and feed calculator. Make sure to set your machine settings for max spindle RPM and I normally set the feed and spindle sliders to 80% for my machine. You’ll probably want more like 60% if you don’t have any kind of coolant/chip clearing system.

A risk is making the feed rate tool slow for the spindle speed and rubbing the cutter instead of getting good chips. That will wear out the cutter pretty fast. So if you have a fixed 18k rpm spindle speed then you’ll probably have pretty fast feed rates and should control stepover and depth of cut to reduce material removal rate.

Thanks for FSwizard tip, I need something like to get me going. I do have spindle speed control, I have the same Masso controller as a Onefinity. I built this router but it looks like it might turn out pretty good, I will see. I am away from it for a few months, working on CAM proficiency for now.
Thanks for the help.

BTW, I am in Arizona right now so get to ride my bike!

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Alot to unpack here. 18k spindle is good but you have to balance that with the speed the router can accurately move. .001" ipt (inch per tooth) might be a good starting point with conventional end mills.

I did get some time to run a number of parts, so found I need to tram the spindle better and work some more on dust collection. I am realizing the speeds and feeds are critical. Its little frustrating to leave it without having the time get dialed in and familiar with the CAM side of it. It looks like FSWizard is good starting point for me and see how those numbers work with tooling I have.