Trick to Easily Copy Toolpaths
Have you ever needed to copy toolpaths to different sheets in Vectric software? This video will show you how to do that with a very simple trick and it will allow you to save hours of time recreating toolpaths for every sheet! This lesson applies to Vectric VCarve, Aspire, and Cut2D.
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Video Transcript:
Are you struggling copying toolpaths over to other sheets in Vectric software? Well, in this quick tip, I'm gonna show you a nice and easy method to copy those toolpaths over and also some tips on how to automate that process by using layers. And you can see this first sheet, if we look at it in the 3D view, we have these two toolpaths here.
And then we look at how to copy those same toolpaths to our second sheet. And that would allow us to make our next sheet. And this is just a simple example here, but this will apply to any type of project you have with multiple sheets and multiple toolpaths. So let's get started. So first off, if you want a new sheet, you will go to the sheet.
And this will only be available in version 11 or above. So if using an older version of Vectric software, you will not have this option. But in here you're gonna click add new at the bottom, and then you'll see a new sheet will appear the same exact size as the previous one. You can right click on that and edit it.
If you want to change the size For this example, I'm going to leave it the same. Now before creating the toolpaths on the next, it's best to create nice layers if you're trying to copy over similar items. So right now you can see I have one layer and everything's on that layer. And if you take a look at my toolpaths, you can see I have two different toolpaths, one for the pockets in the center and then one for the profile on the outside.
So personally what I like to do is organize the layers by whatever toolpaths I am using. So I'll show you if I go to layer. And if I rename that to pocket, and I can even make that a different color, if I wanted to, let's say red, you can see now all the vectors are red because now all of those vectors are on the pocket layer.
So I only want the center ones on that layer, this outer circle, I'm going to right click on that and go to copy to layer, and I'm gonna go onto a new layer. And this one I'm going to name.
And I can even change this one to a different color. Let's say blue click okay. And now when I deselect it, you can see I now have a blue line for the profile layers and then red lines for the pocket layer. And you can see that up here. So anything that's red will be a pocket. Anything that's blue will be a profile.
Now that I've done that, I have to adjust my toolpaths to associate with those layers, because right now these toolpaths, do not know that these are on separate layers. So you can do that by either creating a new toolpath. Or if you have an existing one, you can double click on it. And then at the bottom where it says, Vectric selection is set to manual, I want to switch this to automatic.
That way, when I create the new template for the next sheet, it will automatically select anything on that layer. So I'm gonna go to the Vectric selector, and this is going to appear the form that you're gonna use to filter what you're after. So if I move this to the side, whenever I filter these results, it will select what I filter in the job.
So in this case, I want closed vectors and I want to associate those with the toolpath that's gonna set it to automatically select these. And for this one, this is the pocket toolpath. So I'm going to select the pocket layer that we created, and you can see it'll automatically select those vectors. And it looks like I must have accidentally copied that line on the outside instead of moved it to a different layer because it looks like I have one selected out there.
So if I click close and if I hide the profile layer, You could see there is a red line there on the outside. So I'm going to delete that, I don't need that. Turn back the visibility of the profile layer. And now we're back in business. So let's go back to that selector and we're gonna do the same thing.
Close vectors associate with the toolpath on the pocket layer. Now it's only selecting those inside shapes. So I'm gonna click close. Now that switched the vector selection to automatic. So now I'm gonna calculate that. And this should be the same as before. So we can preview that just to make sure. And that's looking good.
So now on the second tool path, I'm going to double click on that and I'm going to do the same thing. Go to the vector selector. This time I'm gonna do close vectors on the profile layer and we wanna make sure that we associate with the toolpath, click close, and then click calculate, and then we can preview that to make sure and everything is looking good.
So what we just did there was made the toolpaths automatically select any vectors that are on those layers. That makes it much easier when you have a lot of vectors and a lot of toolpaths. If you're only working with a few toolpaths like this example, it's not too hard to do without that. But if you're working with a complicated project or a project with a lot of vectors or toolpaths, I would recommend organizing your layers like we just did.
All right, so now let's look at how to copy over the toolpaths to the second sheet. So first I'm gonna copy the vectors over there. So I'm gonna take what we have here. I'm going to right click on this and I'm gonna copy to sheet two. And then in sheet two, I'm gonna double click on that to make it active.
And you can see in here we have no toolpaths because all of our toolpaths were created on sheet one. And unfortunately, Vectric does not have a simple way to copy that over yet. I'm hoping in a future version, they make it where you can just right click on the tool path and copy it to the next sheet.
However, for now, what we have to do is first edit the vectors if you need. I'm just gonna mirror the mouth down here, just clicking the shortcut key, the letter V to mirror vertically. And I'm gonna move it up just to give this one a different look. And like I said, we have no toolpaths. So the way to copy these toolpaths over to a new sheet is to either go back to creating a toolpath.
If you just created a tool path on the previous sheet, it should remember most of your last used settings here. You might just have to reset, like the tabs or ramps or something like that. But as far as the cut depths, the tool and the machining vectors options, it will remember all of those. So if you wanted to, you can just reset up a new toolpath like this.
However, if you have a lot of complicated toolpaths, what you can do instead is go back to the first sheet that we created them on by double clicking on that. Then select all your toolpaths that you want to copy over to your next sheets. And if you have a pro version of Vectric software, that will be either VCarve Pro or Cut 2D Pro, or if you have Aspire, you're gonna have these options to save the Toolpath as a template, and you're gonna first check Mark all the ones you want.
And then click this one here with a light bulb that says, save All Visible Toolpaths as a template. And unfortunately, if you have the desktop versions, you will not have this option. But if you have the Pro versions or Aspire, you're gonna save your Toolpath to your computer. You can save it whatever folder you want to.
And it's gonna automatically give it the name of whatever your job is saved as. So you could rename it if you want. I'll name it as Face and click save. And now that just saved it to our computer as a toolpath template file. So what that means is now we can go to our next sheet by double clicking on it.
And you can see we still have no toolpaths in here. So now we're gonna click this button over here that says Load Toolpath template. And when you click on that, we can now find that Toolpath template that we just saved, which is this one here, face and click open. And it's gonna ask you if you would like to apply that template to all the sheets.
That's only gonna be relevant if you're working with multiple sheets that you want to apply the template to every. In this case, sheet one is already done. We only need it on sheet two. So if you only want it on the single sheet, click no. Otherwise click yes. But for this one, I'm gonna click no. So that just copied these tool paths over here, and you'll see if I select these, it's not showing any toolpath.
And that's because when you do that, you just have to click this button here that says Recalculate All toolpaths. Now that will recalculate every sheet, so that will also recalculate sheet one. So instead you can also check mark these two toolpaths and right click on one of them and click Recalculate, and then click Recalculate Visible.
And that will only recalculate those two toolpaths on this sheet. And since we associated the toolpath with the layers, this is the only reason this is going to work. If we didn't do that earlier, we would have to open each individual toolpath and select the vectors manually that we wanted to associate them with.
But since these toolpaths are set up automatically to select the vectors on those layers, we can click this button here and you can see it automatically selected these two layers and associated those toolpaths with them. And now if we go to the preview, you can see we have a brand new set of toolpaths with our new vectors.
And now you can see sheet two has toolpaths. And if we drop down this menu, we can go to sheet one and Sheet one has the other toolpaths. So that is the method I currently use to copy toolpaths to other sheets. Like I said, hopefully Vectric adds an option where you can just right click on this and copy it to another sheet.
Unfortunately, you cannot do that right now. However, I hope these tips helped and if they did, make sure you leave a comment down below. That's all for this video. Make sure you like and subscribe for more. And if you wanna master your Vectric software, make sure you check out my Vectric training classes.
Linked right here, where we go much more in depth. How to use the Vectric software step by step. And included with my training courses is weekly Q&A calls where I answer your questions one-on-one and get the support you need. And if you wanna watch another great Vectric tip, check out this video posted right here.
And then we look at how to copy those same toolpaths to our second sheet. And that would allow us to make our next sheet. And this is just a simple example here, but this will apply to any type of project you have with multiple sheets and multiple toolpaths. So let's get started. So first off, if you want a new sheet, you will go to the sheet.
And this will only be available in version 11 or above. So if using an older version of Vectric software, you will not have this option. But in here you're gonna click add new at the bottom, and then you'll see a new sheet will appear the same exact size as the previous one. You can right click on that and edit it.
If you want to change the size For this example, I'm going to leave it the same. Now before creating the toolpaths on the next, it's best to create nice layers if you're trying to copy over similar items. So right now you can see I have one layer and everything's on that layer. And if you take a look at my toolpaths, you can see I have two different toolpaths, one for the pockets in the center and then one for the profile on the outside.
So personally what I like to do is organize the layers by whatever toolpaths I am using. So I'll show you if I go to layer. And if I rename that to pocket, and I can even make that a different color, if I wanted to, let's say red, you can see now all the vectors are red because now all of those vectors are on the pocket layer.
So I only want the center ones on that layer, this outer circle, I'm going to right click on that and go to copy to layer, and I'm gonna go onto a new layer. And this one I'm going to name.
And I can even change this one to a different color. Let's say blue click okay. And now when I deselect it, you can see I now have a blue line for the profile layers and then red lines for the pocket layer. And you can see that up here. So anything that's red will be a pocket. Anything that's blue will be a profile.
Now that I've done that, I have to adjust my toolpaths to associate with those layers, because right now these toolpaths, do not know that these are on separate layers. So you can do that by either creating a new toolpath. Or if you have an existing one, you can double click on it. And then at the bottom where it says, Vectric selection is set to manual, I want to switch this to automatic.
That way, when I create the new template for the next sheet, it will automatically select anything on that layer. So I'm gonna go to the Vectric selector, and this is going to appear the form that you're gonna use to filter what you're after. So if I move this to the side, whenever I filter these results, it will select what I filter in the job.
So in this case, I want closed vectors and I want to associate those with the toolpath that's gonna set it to automatically select these. And for this one, this is the pocket toolpath. So I'm going to select the pocket layer that we created, and you can see it'll automatically select those vectors. And it looks like I must have accidentally copied that line on the outside instead of moved it to a different layer because it looks like I have one selected out there.
So if I click close and if I hide the profile layer, You could see there is a red line there on the outside. So I'm going to delete that, I don't need that. Turn back the visibility of the profile layer. And now we're back in business. So let's go back to that selector and we're gonna do the same thing.
Close vectors associate with the toolpath on the pocket layer. Now it's only selecting those inside shapes. So I'm gonna click close. Now that switched the vector selection to automatic. So now I'm gonna calculate that. And this should be the same as before. So we can preview that just to make sure. And that's looking good.
So now on the second tool path, I'm going to double click on that and I'm going to do the same thing. Go to the vector selector. This time I'm gonna do close vectors on the profile layer and we wanna make sure that we associate with the toolpath, click close, and then click calculate, and then we can preview that to make sure and everything is looking good.
So what we just did there was made the toolpaths automatically select any vectors that are on those layers. That makes it much easier when you have a lot of vectors and a lot of toolpaths. If you're only working with a few toolpaths like this example, it's not too hard to do without that. But if you're working with a complicated project or a project with a lot of vectors or toolpaths, I would recommend organizing your layers like we just did.
All right, so now let's look at how to copy over the toolpaths to the second sheet. So first I'm gonna copy the vectors over there. So I'm gonna take what we have here. I'm going to right click on this and I'm gonna copy to sheet two. And then in sheet two, I'm gonna double click on that to make it active.
And you can see in here we have no toolpaths because all of our toolpaths were created on sheet one. And unfortunately, Vectric does not have a simple way to copy that over yet. I'm hoping in a future version, they make it where you can just right click on the tool path and copy it to the next sheet.
However, for now, what we have to do is first edit the vectors if you need. I'm just gonna mirror the mouth down here, just clicking the shortcut key, the letter V to mirror vertically. And I'm gonna move it up just to give this one a different look. And like I said, we have no toolpaths. So the way to copy these toolpaths over to a new sheet is to either go back to creating a toolpath.
If you just created a tool path on the previous sheet, it should remember most of your last used settings here. You might just have to reset, like the tabs or ramps or something like that. But as far as the cut depths, the tool and the machining vectors options, it will remember all of those. So if you wanted to, you can just reset up a new toolpath like this.
However, if you have a lot of complicated toolpaths, what you can do instead is go back to the first sheet that we created them on by double clicking on that. Then select all your toolpaths that you want to copy over to your next sheets. And if you have a pro version of Vectric software, that will be either VCarve Pro or Cut 2D Pro, or if you have Aspire, you're gonna have these options to save the Toolpath as a template, and you're gonna first check Mark all the ones you want.
And then click this one here with a light bulb that says, save All Visible Toolpaths as a template. And unfortunately, if you have the desktop versions, you will not have this option. But if you have the Pro versions or Aspire, you're gonna save your Toolpath to your computer. You can save it whatever folder you want to.
And it's gonna automatically give it the name of whatever your job is saved as. So you could rename it if you want. I'll name it as Face and click save. And now that just saved it to our computer as a toolpath template file. So what that means is now we can go to our next sheet by double clicking on it.
And you can see we still have no toolpaths in here. So now we're gonna click this button over here that says Load Toolpath template. And when you click on that, we can now find that Toolpath template that we just saved, which is this one here, face and click open. And it's gonna ask you if you would like to apply that template to all the sheets.
That's only gonna be relevant if you're working with multiple sheets that you want to apply the template to every. In this case, sheet one is already done. We only need it on sheet two. So if you only want it on the single sheet, click no. Otherwise click yes. But for this one, I'm gonna click no. So that just copied these tool paths over here, and you'll see if I select these, it's not showing any toolpath.
And that's because when you do that, you just have to click this button here that says Recalculate All toolpaths. Now that will recalculate every sheet, so that will also recalculate sheet one. So instead you can also check mark these two toolpaths and right click on one of them and click Recalculate, and then click Recalculate Visible.
And that will only recalculate those two toolpaths on this sheet. And since we associated the toolpath with the layers, this is the only reason this is going to work. If we didn't do that earlier, we would have to open each individual toolpath and select the vectors manually that we wanted to associate them with.
But since these toolpaths are set up automatically to select the vectors on those layers, we can click this button here and you can see it automatically selected these two layers and associated those toolpaths with them. And now if we go to the preview, you can see we have a brand new set of toolpaths with our new vectors.
And now you can see sheet two has toolpaths. And if we drop down this menu, we can go to sheet one and Sheet one has the other toolpaths. So that is the method I currently use to copy toolpaths to other sheets. Like I said, hopefully Vectric adds an option where you can just right click on this and copy it to another sheet.
Unfortunately, you cannot do that right now. However, I hope these tips helped and if they did, make sure you leave a comment down below. That's all for this video. Make sure you like and subscribe for more. And if you wanna master your Vectric software, make sure you check out my Vectric training classes.
Linked right here, where we go much more in depth. How to use the Vectric software step by step. And included with my training courses is weekly Q&A calls where I answer your questions one-on-one and get the support you need. And if you wanna watch another great Vectric tip, check out this video posted right here.
