Polar slicer?
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Hi I came here looking for plugins to accomplish 4th axis milling with my cnc machine. The way fourth axis milling works is the machine controls the cutting tool in x and z. The fourth axis holds the cut stock and rotates it under the tool so the machine can mill in 360 degrees. There's a program out there called CNC Wrapper that will take a 3d or 2.5d surface from a plane and "wrap" it around a cylinder to create machine instructions - gcode for the fourth axis.
Is it possible in sketchup to take a 3d model and slice it from the center z axis in a polar fashion and "unwrap it" so it lay on a plane? Does this plugin exist. Currently one of the big differences between hobby priced cam packages and the more expensive professional versions is fourth axis milling. This plugin therefore would be very popular I think.
Any pointers to a how to write scripts for sketchup -- would the proposed function be very difficult?
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There is a Unfold.rb with a visual demo somewhere in the forum. See if this can help?
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