Delcam GmbH to show latest PartMaker at Turning Days, Germany

Delcam Germany will demonstrate the latest PartMaker software for the programming of turn-mill machines and Swiss-type lathes at the Turning Days event to be held from 23rd to 25th April. Turning Days is located in Villingen-Schwenningen, in the middle of the turned-parts manufacturing cluster in the Schwarzwald-Baar region and close to Switzerland, the home, of course, of the Swiss-type machine.

The appearance at Turning Days is another step in the drive to repeat in Germany the success that PartMaker has achieved in North America. Many of leading builders of multi-axis lathes and Swiss-type lathes are based in Germany and Switzerland, while the Schwarzwald-Baar region includes a large number of end-users for the machines.

Visitors to Turning Days this year will see major changes to PartMaker since the launch of the program in Germany at the 2007 event. This reflects the increased investment made in the development of the system following its acquisition by Delcam. Indeed, PartMaker Division President, Hanan Fishman, hailed the release as the largest leap in PartMaker technology in one year since the initial launch of the program in 1994. The key enhancements include a new, more efficient user interface, direct programming onto solid models and automatic creation of set-up sheets.

Sleeker User Interface

The latest release features a sleek, new-look user interface featuring, among other improvements, easy-to-use, user-configurable toolbars. Existing icons have been redesigned to make them even easier to understand. The new tool bars, populated by attractive and easy to understand icons, make the software faster and more productive for both new and existing users.

Seamless Solids Programming

The new version gives users the ability to carry out programming directly on a solid model. Critical manufacturing data is retrieved automatically from a solid model using the software’s new "Extract Parameters from Solids” feature, thus saving time and reducing the chance for error by eliminating redundant data entry. The most commonly used solids-manipulation functions are displayed via an easy-to-follow Solids Toolbar.

Automatic Set-up Sheet Creation

Very professional set-up sheets can now be generated automatically to improve shop-floor documentation. The format of the set-up sheets generated by PartMaker is fully customizable by the user. This new feature can greatly speed up machine set-up time by eliminating the tedious and time-consuming process of creating set-up sheets manually and by providing machine operators and set-up personnel very clear instructions about how to set-up a new job. Set-up sheets are created in HTML format and so can be viewed on any computer with a standard internet browser.