VCarve Pro

Upon a strong recommendation by Seth in early July, I decided to transition away from Inkscape and towards a more advanced and powerful software package called VCarve Pro. VCarve Pro is an all -purpose CNC Routing 2D and 3D job creation package that can also export as DXF, which is perfect for RDWorks. Moreover, Seth is claiming that the DXF export/import process has higher fidelity with VCarve Pro then with Inkscape.

So today I finished reading and practicing through all of the reference manual chapters on 2D job creation and general main menu and right click menu usage.

Seth is correct; the complexity of the stencil designs I can create in a relatively convenient fashion far exceeds what can be easily accomplished in Inkscape.

I am now creating a new main menu tab on this blogsite named VCarve Pro that will contain tips, workarounds and alerts to any usage issues with VCarve Pro.

Save time on color assignments: If you are planning to export your design as DXF for importing into RDWorks, use the layer drop down menu in VCarve Pro to set customized colors for each layer. Put each object (or grouping of similar objects) into a layer by itself. The DXF format will respect that, and so will RDworks when you open the DXF of your design there. Conveniently, all of your color designations and layers will automatically populate into the Work Tab. Then all you have to do is set layer properties of speed/rep rate/power/priority. You are saved the time of assigning colors.

Warning: Sometimes, without any notice, VCarve Pro will save redundant and exactly superimposed shapes upon DXF export.  This has happened to me with VCarve ellipses in particular. This will make color assignments, as mentioned above, not be respected visually on the RDWorks Canvas. Typically, all such shapes will appear as black. If you suspect this is happening, just go to the Layers Work Tab, set the Hide property to "yes" and see if any other exact shape/object is underneath with the color expected. Then just delete the redundant shape/object.

F9 will center a selected object to the material space. You can also use the Align transform tool for this. Don't F9 a group, unless the group is already centered or in the orientation you want. For Groups, F9 will center the central point of the group - not the same thing.

Weld and Intersect: You can't do it to members of a group against each other; VCarve Pro considers the group to be one object. First ungroup, apply the transform with left click selects, then regroup.