DXF for Laser
Description
Precisely dimensioned laser cut parts are wonderful to work with. By adjusting your geometry for the width of the laser cut you have full control over how tightly your parts fit together. By using this add-in with a small (or even negative) value for your kerf you can make loose fitting parts for a child's puzzle perhaps. By using an aggressive value (say 0.20 mm - or a value larger than your calculated/measured actual kerf) you can make parts that need to be gently pounded together for no-glue assembly. Then there is the middle ground where parts can be easily dry-fit and disassembled multiple times prior to gluing.
This add-in also supports the creation of multi-layered DXF files, splitting your perimeter and cutouts into their own layers.
Get all of this without modifying your geometry or tediously offsetting and deleting scores of lines and curves - let DXF for Laser do the hard work for you!
This tool is not the best tool for the job, however, it is often the easiest. For those cases where you are dealing with a non-manifold shape or simply require more control over the path generation the manufacturing workspace can be used to generate either a multilayer DXF or gcode toolpaths directly. See Lars' video to learn how https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2M0pwqe-r1M.
I've been using this tool for years. Should be installed by default.
Thanks
This tool has been useful for many times.
What I really miss is the ability to export multiple faces the same time (e.g. for printed plans), although this might be a use-case that doesn't meet with the original purpose of this tool.
I observed one issue, when I export with Laser Kerf = 0mm, then curved edges won't appear in some CAD tool, e.g. in LibreCAD, but they are visible in LightBurn. I'm still not sure if this is a problem with my CAD software or with the current tool, but it might be good to mention... quick workaround, apply a tiny (e.g. 0.1mm) kerf, and missing edges will appear.
I ran into a problem. I did the export of parts of an rc plane model. However, some parts are not fully rendered in CorelDraw x5 or Inkscape. Some lines are missing, and these are mostly irregular lines. However, when I upload the same file to an online dxf viewer, everything is displayed correctly.
I observed the same after importing to LibreCAD, applying a small (0.1mm) kerf instead of 0mm, solved the issue for me.
thank you so much!
works perfect for lightburn
when opening the exported dxf in inkscape the splines are missing
Very Helpful
I've been using DXF4Laser for the last 10 months and it's worked flawlessly in my export workflow. With the most recent F360 update, however, it has failed to provide a save file option after running the projected geometry, leaving me unable to save any files. My colleagues with the same workflow have also just recently run into the same problem. It would be nice to have it up and running again.
easy to use, with great result.
Once I got the add-in installed (I did have to open the .pkg itself and place the .bundle file into the right directory, the installer didn't seem to place anything in my Autodesk folder), it was really great to be able to select a face, set the kerf and download as DXF.
If only it would allow you to select multiple faces, than it would be utterly brilliant! Now, with only 1 face selectable at a time, I'm not sure how often it would be efficient for me sadly.
(PS: For some faces, it would immediately close the "save as" window for me, without saving, but luckily I could still manually save the "Cut all" sketch that had been created.)
This is not working since my fusion updated anyone else having problem?
Make sure you are running the latest version. There indeed was a breaking change back in May so if it had been a while since you've used Fusion then this updated version will likely solve your problem.
Hi, I need to export DXF to be sent to a carbon fibre cutter, but he doesn't use laser. Can you confirm that setting KERF to 0 does not alter the output at all?
Right clicking the sketch and exporting to DXF includes contruction lines, which is a pain for him and could lead to ambiguity, exporting the whole model results in multiple items in the DXF, which again is a pain, so it seems like this tool is the simplest solution
Correct, a kerf of 0 will simply generate a clean DXF file without any offsetting of lines. You can also enter negative kerf values if the desire is to have loser fitting parts.
Really easy to use and Mega helpful, Ive just come across a problem though where the kerf doesnt seem to be doing anything - Mind you, it could be due to my chinese laser program.
Nice for a "one of surface". But without the support for exporting multiple faces at the same time it is faster to export them the normal way and scale them in illustrator.
Had to change SketchPanel to SolidModifyPanel in add_button and remove_button to get this tool to load correctly in the new UI.
Thankyou Tony, This was very helpful! For anyone not fluent in programming (like myself) DESIGN workspace> TOOLS Tab> ADD-INS dropdown> script and addins> Add-ins tab> DXF4Laser> Edit (you may need to restart fusion after editor installs)> Change 'SketchPanel' to 'SolidModifyPanel' in add_button and remove_button Button will appear In SOLID tab> Modify (Restart of fusion may be required) Hope that helps
Thanks Tony, and Matt for this, the fix worked fine. What a relief!
I could't select multiple faces but otherwise it worked perfect for all my 2D sketches I had to convert to .dxf.
Before this add on, I have to manually offset each line.
This add on save me a lot of time.
I've lost couple hours before download this script and make all I want literally in minutes. Super tool, thanx!
But, want make a suggestion:
On my CNC acceleration/decelleration takes so much time, so if cutting trajectory have sharp corners, laser stops over ot and overburns that corner. It will be good, if resultant countour will have some rounding (arcs, e.g.) in that places, so machine will travel over corners in more smooth manner
Thank you so much, you really saved me from the nightmare of using the inbuilt DXF export...
Unfortunately now I have the same issues with this tool during DXF export which i had with the inbuilt feature in Fusuon360 before. Every line is moved and open geometry's everywhere :(
This tool uses the built in DXF export function. It just does what it can to make a clean, and offset, sketch first. It sounds like you have a legitimate bug to report with the DXF export. The only way I know of to report a bug is on the Fusion 360 forums.
Great~!! This app save a lot of time. Thanks so much.
good export to dxf, want to donate you, but have no paypal. maybe you have some other payment systems?
Any and all Tips/Donations are welcome at https://www.paypal.me/korsky I'm glad this tool can help!
Simple Effective Accurate Wonderful! Six Stars! ☆☆☆☆☆
Thank you for the kind words and your rather generous donation too! (P.S. that's still 5 stars ;)
I love your plugin! An awesome feature would be the feature to autamaticaly add the component name to the part when working with large projects
I was using the default option for Fusion to export the dxf files, but it was very annoying and time consuming, and actually our lasercutter doesn't open them, I had to open Illustrator to export them again to make it work. The plugin just brilliantly solve everything and it even separate different paths on different layers so that it's possible to set up the cutting parameter individually and choose the cutting order. The automatic naming is also very handy (component - body.dxf). One last thing to make it perfect (for me at least) would be to add the choice to close/join the paths in a continuous one so that I don't have to do it in the software of the lasercutter.
I'm sure each laser cutting software handles things a bit differently but I've also noticed the generation of rather silly cut sequences (using VisiCut) from time to time myself. Largely this has not been an issue for me, aside from adding a little to the cut time, as I have the privilege of having access to a very nice laser cutter (but I do not own one myself) with high accuracy and repeatability so I don't get any start/stop artifacts of note - but I can see how for large cuts it would be helpful to keep cut times down and for cutters with less positional repeatability there could be some un-wanted start-stop artifacts as well. I'm not sure how best to optimize the DXF file, or how practical it would be to do so. Saying "DXF file" is sort of like saying "XML file" - there is little standardization outside of some key "elements" and conventional use of command codes. I'm curious how you prepare the files for cutting, does your software package largely handle the path optimizations automatically, or is it a lot of manual work? What software do you use? Would you be willing & able to share a before and after DXF file with me - preferably one that is "simple" (with a reality minimal set of shapes and lines) but at the same time exercises many common cases? Feel free to e-mail me directly at ross.korsky@gmail.com
Got clean results without nearly as much hassle.
Simple Effective Accurate Wonderful! Six Stars
This tool seems like it would be about the handiest thing around, were it not for the non-manifold face issue. I want so badly to use it to eliminate all of the manual offset geometry creation I have to do in Lasercad to account for kerf width, but every single face I try comes up as being non-manifold. I sure hope that feature gets added.
It would be good if you could pick more than one face if the part to be cut was already nested It produces a clean .dxf what is realy good
This would be really useful. Right now I can't really use this plugin, because any text I have added to a component causes holes in the output because I can't select the face that is the centre of an "O" for example.
Works perfect for simple and medium contours. Will make my life much easier! It is also very fast! But it needs some improvement for complex geometries. Would be nice if you could generate an Add-In out of your Script.