Turning template into a file

[HondaFL400r]

Hi

I have a buggy project and have made an engine mount template out of wood but would now like to get it cut. It is just a shape to be cut out of 5mm flat steel plate but how do i go about getting my template turned into a file for a plasma cutting machine? With this current situation most companies would prefer you to send them a file so they can just cut from that.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks
Dan

[ngwagwa]

You could trace round it onto paper, scan it and save as a .jpg then go to convertio.co and convert it to a DXF file

[Clive S]

Hi

I have a buggy project and have made an engine mount template out of wood but would now like to get it cut. It is just a shape to be cut out of 5mm flat steel plate but how do i go about getting my template turned into a file for a plasma cutting machine? With this current situation most companies would prefer you to send them a file so they can just cut from that.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks
Dan

Any CAD program should be able to output a DXF file format that they would need.

There are plenty of free cad programs including fusion360

[JAZZCNC]

In most decent Cad packages you can load a good quality picture, taken from directly above against a plain back ground that contrasts with the part ie: black on white and accurately measure the length and height of the part then load it into Cad as back ground then trace it and scale it to size. Some will even do the tracing for you.

You can then print it at 1:1 and test against your pattern part, if it's correct send them the file or make any alterations needed.

If you haven't got Cad and can't do this then take the Pic like mentioned above with measurments and I'll do it for you.

[HondaFL400r]

I drew round the template and scanned it into my computer as a pdf file, then printed it to check that it prints to the exact size or the actual template and it does. I hope this is good enough for the cutting company.

[Wal]

>and scanned it into my computer as a pdf file

The .pdf format is widely accepted, but it sounds to me like you've just embedded a raster file into the document - that is to say, it's a scanned image (a bitmap, or a jpeg) as opposed to actual vector information which describes the shape numerically - this is what the 'tracing' stage is all about - converting the picture into a vector... I doubt very much that your scanning software has converted said scan into vectors for you... You'll effectively be sending the shop a pretty picture with no useful information for them to base the cutting on.

My suggestion would be to import your scanned image into an application (such as inkscape or illustrator) and use that to trace the lines and curves that make up your design, then get rid of the image from the canvas and save the resulting line-work as a .pdf

Inkscape is open source and easy enough to get to grips with.

Wal,

[HondaFL400r]

You have lost me with all these formats, but what I did do was open the pdf file and I could use the measurement tool and select points on the image and it would give me the distance between these points that matched my template, don't know if that helps?

[Wal]

That just tells you that the image has been scanned 1:1 and is un-scaled as it appears in the document.

It doesn't mean that the file contains any meaningful information relating to the shapes you want cutting out. But hey, maybe the machine shop is quite used to being sent this kind of document and someone there will be happy to draw around the picture for you. It's entirely possible. I often have to trace vague scanned shapes. It's a way of doing it, I guess - trouble is that you're leaving it open for the third party to make assumptions on. Personally I'd always want to send something as unambiguous as possible.

Wal.