Being able to control perfect graining included in a single product, or even from product to product has been difficult in previous Microvellum releases.  There is now the ability to tell the optimizer what to perfect grain inside of a product, or even what products to include in a blueprint match elevation of cabinets. 

To do this, enter a # sign and number in the perfect grain info cell of the parts that will be grain matched.  In this example, we will take a 2 Door 2 Drawer cabinet and perfect grain the left and right sides separately.

First, access the product properties and look at the left door and left drawer front and enter #1 in the perfect grain info cell for each part.

Second, access the right door and right drawer front and enter #2 in the perfect grain info cell for each part.

When running this cabinet through the optimizer, it will group all the parts with #1 together and the parts with #2 together.  If there are multiple cabinets like this, different numbers will need to be put in for the different cabinets as it will try and group all like numbers.

You can use this same logic to do perfect grain matching across multiple cabinets as well.  For instance, you can tell the optimizer to match all the doors in the following image together by putting a #1 in the perfect grain info box for each door.  The problem with this is all the doors will not all fit on one sheet, so it will need to be broken up.  Putting #1 in the doors for 1.03 and 1.04 and #2 in the doors for 1.05 and 1.06 will then create two separate grain containers, which will then fit on a sheet. 

If the optimizer cannot fit the grain container on a sheet, it will display a message indicating the size of the container and continue moving on.   If you are unsure how the parts are being laid out on the sheet to create that container, increase the sheet size beyond the size of the grain container it displayed, and try again.  This will at least display the patterns it is optimizing, and then adjustments can be made to your products.

All other perfect graining rules still apply to figuring out if it can be perfect grained together.  They must be on the same plane, and it is best to keep the machine points either 1 or 3M.  If you use others, you will get unexpected results.

This new perfect grain option will work with all Nesting Optimization types, Microvellum Sawing Optimization, and Ardis Optimization.

Troubleshooting

Should a part with perfect graining applied to it be rotated incorrectly in the Nest but drawn correctly in 3D, draw the part in 2D and ensure it is oriented the same as the other members of the Perfect Graining group.

If the 2D drawing is oriented incorrectly, open Part Properties, and select the incorrect subassembly. The Width and Length parameters have likely been swapped in that particular part, and the Y-Orientation has been changed. Verify if this is the case by comparing the incorrectly nested part with the correctly nested parts. If this is the case, reverse the changes to the incorrect part.

Reprocess the Nest to verify that the changes fixed the rotation of the incorrect part.

For more information, see Overview: Part Material Graining.