[Patrick McGrath]

Anyone have experience of or can recommend a computer program for optimising sheet usage?

We do not nest – we do our initial material cutting on the wall saw before processing on the CNC. Thus we have to work out how best to get fascia strips, covings, upstands and panels from the available material. (In case you are wondering, our CNC bed id Pod based and not a flat board so is not adapted for cutting strips and small parts.)

We have tried one Shareware program with some success but it wasn’t really user friendly. Otherwise we work it out with pen and paper which is proving time consuming when when you have to get through 6 – 8 projects a day.

A well thought out cutting sheet can make a huge impact on the percentage that material costs contribute to overhead. All ideas welcome.

[Andy Graves]

We use AlphaCAM but the nesting is not really the best solution. I understand programs like ArtCAM will nest because they work with odd shapes for the sign industry.

Hope that helps a little. If you find something, please share, I would love to find something that works prefect.

[Jon Olson]

Patrick .we love nesting here. Much of it we out source to a very talented programmer that has developed his own system. The savings  % 30 per job more than out weighs the cost . If interested contact me

 

jon@sterlingsurfaces.com

 

[Guy Robertson]

We use CadCode for our optimizer.  It drives both our selco beam saw (saw optimization) and our Andi router (nested based optimization).  It’s probably not what you are looking for if you only have a vertical saw.

I’ve also seen this one which is a pay per use one.
http://MyNesting.com

[Patrick McGrath]

This is an example of the type of Cutting List that we presently generate manually and which we would like to replicate digitally.
I am not certain how clear the above will be once posted so I’ll make another attempt at uploading something clearer.

[Patrick McGrath]

That should be a bit clearer.
You can see it is not a complex problem but it consumes a lot of brain time.

Jon, I think from this you will see that nesting is probably not the solution.

[Jon Olson]

Hey Patrick, We nest much more than even that. The cost savings on material out weigh any other disadvantage. I ‘ll e-mail a work to show  you

[Len Smith]

Hi Jon,

Can you email me a sample too? I’d be interested in seeing if we could do better than we currently do.

Thanks,

Len

[John Christensen]

Jon,
Maybe you could share it here so that we can all get smarter.

Johnny C

[Jeff Vickers]

Hi Jon,

Will you please copy me in.

We find for countertops that the drawing package that comes with the LT laser is very quick for optimisation & slab layout.

[Andy Graves]

Here is a video I did with a vanity top. I nested the parts and you can view the cut order and direction.

[Author]

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