Steve Ryan is the owner
of RyanTech Engineering (www.ryantecheng.com),
a small design and prototyping firm
located in California. His company is
a leader in designing innovative battery-powered
Personal Transportation Vehicles (PTV),
as well as other products such as lightweight
bikes (see figure 1) and racecars (see
figure 2).
Fig 1 – A lightweight bike
frame designed by RyanTech Engineering
Fig 2 –
A racecar designed by RyanTech
Engineering
Since he started his
company back in 1989, he has always
been at the forefront of technology.
Many years ago, he began using Mastercam
from CNC Software for his manufacturing
needs, however, despite his best efforts,
he found the product had “too
much of a learning curve.” He
also tried lower-cost products, like
BobCAD, thinking that they would be
easier – which they were –
but then he ran up against a lack of
the CAM features he needed to manufacture
his high-precision aluminum and plastic
prototypes.
So about three years ago, Ryan started
to search for a new CAM program. He
looked at GibbsCAM, ArtCAM and a few
others, but decided that they weren’t
worth the money. “There were not
many systems back then that featured
a graphical user interface. So when
we saw VisualMill from MecSoft we were
impressed with how easy it seemed and
how it was actually in our price range,”
recalls Ryan. “The kicker was
finding out how robust it was. I remember
thinking ‘my goodness –
there are high-end products out there
and VisualMill has many of their same
tools at a fraction of the price, all
within a simple interface.’”
As it turned out, VisualMill’s
graphical user interface wasn’t
just smoke and mirrors. “The software
was truly easy to learn – it only
took me a half day to get up and running
with it – and that’s without
any formal training. Since then, the
support has been phenomenal,”
Ryan said echoing the comments of other
VisualMill users who, like Ryan, have
recalled times when the post-processor
they required arrived from MecSoft via
email in 20 minutes.
Favorite Tools
Now a veteran of the product, he points
to the flexibility of the software as
being one of its many strong points.
“One of our machines uses cold
air as a coolant, while a vacuum removes
scrap material. We were able to alter
the G-code so that both the machine
and vacuum turn it on and off automatically.
It sounds simple, but it has proved
to be a great time saver,” Ryan
said.
Ryan also points to the flexibility
when machining, noting that “in
VisualMill, there are different ways
to attack a machining problem –
it gives us a lot of approaches to cut
material the way we want to.”
He also pointed out how the software
has helped to “up the quality,
due to little things like being able
to control the stepover, in addition
to the amount of control we now have
over the toolpath with VisualMill. In
addition, we are able to machine items
that we weren’t able to before,
which has helped to expand our business.”
Ryan also pointed out how his company
is better able to retain customers because
of the improved turnaround times that
have occurred since VisualMill was implemented.
As a company heavily involved in prototypes,
Ryan also points to the Region command
(see figure 3) as one of the program’s
most useful tools.
It allows him to control toolpath in
a small region, so “you don’t
have to re-machine the entire part if
there is a change, such as a pocket
that needs to be deeper. This is helpful
when you are dealing with prototypes,”
Ryan said. Currently still on version
4, he is looking forward to moving to
version 5, which has extended re-machining
capabilities, among its many enhancements.
Fig 3 – Region Control is
one of the most important features
of VisualMill, and this image shows
how a set of holes can be selected
and then a Peck Drill operation
performed only on them.
Other Programs
In addition to VisualMill, Ryan also
uses SolidWorks and Rhino. From SolidWorks
he exports an IGES file, which he says
comes over fine in almost all cases
. He talked about how with IGES you
can export sketches, which automatically
become regions in VisualMill, which
is very handy. If there is a problem
with a model, like a missing surface,
then he simply goes from SolidWorks
to Rhino, manually removes and rebuilds
the offending surface and then moves
that Rhino model into VisualMill. “The
direct translation from Rhino is great,
and the three programs work together
really well,” Ryan pointed out.
As a side business, Ryan also creates
prototypes for other companies so he
has extensive experience dealing with
many other types of file formats and
he is satisfied with VisualMill’s
import capabilities.
Figure 4 – This model was
imported without any problems from
SolidWorks via IGES
Fig 5 –
Part machined in VisualMill.
Conclusions
Some users start with low-end CAM products
and when they eventually get frustrated
with their lack of features, they migrate
to the high-end. Others start on the
high-end and eventually get frustrated
with their long learning curve and high
maintenance costs, so they move to a
low-end product. Steve Ryan tried both
the high-end and the low-end. However,
he seems happiest – and most productive
– right in the middle, enjoying
outstanding features without sacrificing
power or breaking the bank.
