Delcam launches integrated CAM for SolidWorks CAD

Delcam launched its integrated system at this week's SolidWorks World 2010 exhibition in Anaheim, California, stating that in the next release it will cover more machining operations, including turning, mill-turn and wire EDM. For now though, Delcam for SolidWorks combines PowerMILL and FeatureCAM – applications already familiar tothe more than 30,000 customers around the world – so providing for high-speed of toolpath calculation, with strategies for high-speed machining, including trochoidal roughing, spiral finishing and Delcam's own 'Race-Line Machining' technique. Then on the FeatureCAM side, the new software includes all of the knowledge-based automation and its 'Automatic Feature Recognition' system which now extracts detailed feature information from the SolidWorks model. Delcam says that its system not only recognises holes and pockets within the model, but also groups similar holes by size and type automatically. It also indentifies all the detail within the model, such as draft on pocket walls and any fillets or chamfers within the pocket.