Hello.
I am looking for direction to start development on a software solution for the following:
I have no formal programming skills. My background is in mechanical applications for developing and manufacturing round cutting tools made of carbide for the auto, aerospace and woodworking industries. Basically, I develop drills and endmills to cut and form metal. These tools are manufactured on a precision 5 or 6 axis CNC grinding machine.
I know exactly what the program I am trying to develop must do: interface between human and machine to generate a tool path to manufacture round cutting tools on the CNC grinding machine.
The cad/cam solutions now are ALL archaic, built on 20+ year old code with archaic graphics. User is forced to use a mouse and keyboard to find the typical windows drop down menus and boxes. User is clicking with a mouse in the box / field to enter an integer (number) to get the desired results.
I am trying to develop a software solution with state-of-the-art graphics, rendering of the machine, cutting tools, grinding paths and possibly, real-time logic in the software as if the “rendered” machine was in the real world. The user at the machine would interface with a 30" touchscreen inputting the desired parameters to get the desired end result on the real-world CNC grinding machine. Pinch to zoom, two fingers scroll, basically all of the functions of your phone touchscreen.
There should be a “real-time” logic component in the rendered machine, this would be for use in virtual reality. This would be for remote training for potential customers where a VR headset would be sent to the customer. On the other side would be the applications engineer, wearing the virtual reality headset, they would connect and the trainer and trainee would be in a virtual world with a “real-time logic machine”. Meaning, the machine would have buttons and controls as if the machine were a real live machine. Example: the trainee would try to open the CNC machine door but is not able unless the “open door button” is pressed - ALL in virtual reality and without travelling to the customer. This is the kicker: physically travelling to remote customers nowadays is becoming more and more cumbersome - trying to avoid the travel expense, time, $$ etc etc.
This is what I am trying to tie together:
- The physical 5 or 6 axis CNC grinding machine (kinematics are a moot point at this time)
- UE Engine 5.5 for rendering and VR (possibly use UE for the user interface?)
- Use C++ or Python coding to generate the grinding tool paths to render in UE Engine
- C++ / Python must be translated into G and M code for the machine controls to understand
- Using Yaskawa AC Drives and Yaskawa AC Motors
Where to start?
I’ve uploaded a few pictures for example of the current solutions.
Thank you!
