SolidWorks Tutorials on Demand

Right click on your part and select export as DXF.

You can use Edgecam to convert your solidworks to cnc.

The Edgecam can open solidworks files and export for many other cnc languages... Gcode, mach, fanuc... etc.

I had some water/laser cutting shops not like my DXF files because they were splines.

There is an option in SOLIDWORKS to export Splines as Polylines. I believe this is what Roger referred to above. Hopefully this one setting will allow skipping the use of another program.

I usually turn on th eoption for high quality dwg, and set the option to merge points as well. The point merging should not be needed, but I have not seen it cause any problems.

If working from a 2D image and trying to make a DXF or DWG, I like to use Vector Magic. https://vectormagic.com/

And next charge additional $30-60 to the laser-guy said "your DXFs are not compatible to our software, charge us to update your files". Even if i export as v2000 autocad dxf.

And next step can be "wow, that's great, but i want to move that hole a little bit". Add changes and realize again: "please, charge for files update to our software".

There are no such issues when i draw in AutoCAD or rework exported DXFs in autocad manually.

You can easily check what version of DXF they use by getting a DXF from there laser and right click open with notepad. There you can see the version of AutoCAD they use. Also set to export all splines as polylines and merge as shown. I programmed laser machines and used solidworks long time. The problem that can occur is if you have some holes on a bend edge or spline cutouts which produce lot of small lines when unfold that is hard to read for a CNC. But its still not a point that it cant cutout.

One tip send to other shop maybe they just taking your money for nothing :)

Thank you for such illustrated answer. BTW, did you accidentally spoted with "splines as splines" on your screenshot?

I have been tried different options to export DXF including those parameters in my SW15.

And even then I have only circular fillets going to export as "arc". Conic Rho and conic radius still exports as "spline". Merging does not change anything too. I try because sometimes there are requirements to export as closed loops, but that checkmark does nothing (even i set up 0.001 in input field next to merging checkbox).

I still doing everything manually reopening DXFs in autocad.

Can you please tell me what software do you use and how much manual work it requires to get fully lasercut-compatible DXF?

You can see my other answer where i describe i have spline-as-polyline does not work. Also merging fails. I export planar face with RB-click on it. There are 4 kinds of fillets. But only symmetric circular fillet exports as "arc". All other are splines. I feel i am stuck doing with something definitely wrong.

In the drop box near the top for the export options, set the Version to R2013.

I made a test file like yours with conic fillet options, and the R2013 setting exports the splines as a series of lines.

It appears that SW will only convert splines to multi line segments (instead of also using arcs as needed).

Only symmetric circular fillets are arc. The more complex fillet options are conic based.

I'll try that. But some lasercuts requiring v2000 DXF for export. Maybe they'll eat 2013 if i don't tell them. Need to try. :)

BTW, does inventor has such issue with DXFs? Maybe, i think, better to use autodesk software for lasercut project.. =\

Go see my procedure:

Grabcad tutorial

Convert splines to arcs tangent and lines for CNC

SolidWorks Export DXF in TANGENT ARCS I do not know of a Solidworks macro that can convert "polyline" DXF ​​files into tangent circle arcs. We know that laser machine pilots need it and that some suppliers refuse files containing ellipses splines or only polylines. To export a Solidworks DXF file...

Check out my procedure with the use of Draftsight,

free on Dassault Systems and Solidworks website

https://grabcad.com/tutorials/convert-splines-to-arcs-tangent-and-lines-for-cnc

Looks perfect. I should try that way, thank you!

welcome

I was surfing around to find solution to a problem where SOLIDWORKS Export as DXF for some reason defaults to Front plane, giving me the wrong face in the DXF file - and then I noticed this thread.

There is actually a very good tool for making the laser cutting profiles directly within SOLIDWORKS - even from assembly level.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7a8IiaXtHk

BR

I've been having a lot of issues with this, and I've come back to this exact forum time and again. When I export as DXF, some of my curves are smooth, and some are faceted. It happens with splines, no matter the export options I use, it happens with parabolic curves and ellipses, it sometimes happens with circular arcs, though that's very rare. And what boggles me is that it's not uniform.

Here's an example of an exported DXF, note the faceted lines around the ellipse curves in the rounded part of the R

Hey Zak.

Check out the plineconvertmode system variable in AutoCAD. 0: converts splines to line segments, 1: converts splines to closest matching arcs. I work in the Tradeshow and Museum industry and do laser cut signage by the boat load, and know exactly what you are running into. I will use the Polyline edit command on splines to convert them and generally use a tolerance setting of 1 or 2. On rare occaisions I have to set the tolerance to 3 - I've never had to go higher than that to get a close fit. 8 times out of 10 a tolerance setting of 1 is fine for a very close fit. Feel free to email me if you have any questions. Paul Rowden.

Oops, I just realized this string was referring to SolidWorks exporting - my bad. Just so you know, we have several guys in our department who work primarily in SolidWorks and will still use AutoCAD to go back and tweak their final laser or waterjet patterns for this specific issue to do with spline conversion.

Make a Drawing with top view 1:1 scale, hide the title block and save as DXF. may need to play with which version but for 12 seems work ok.