CAD to CAM Pipeline (Fusion 360/FreeCAD setup, toolpaths, feeds & speeds for local wood & aluminum)

In this episode we take a design from a blank canvas to a toolpath the machine can run. The pipeline has three stages you will use on every job: CAD to draw it, CAM to toolpath it, and a feeds and speeds check so the cut does not burn or chatter.

Start in CAD. Fusion 360 runs on a free personal license and covers almost everything a small shop needs. FreeCAD is fully open source and a fine backup. Draw your part in millimetres, model it at full scale, and keep the origin somewhere you can find again - the top left corner of your material is a good habit.

Now CAM. Set up a job, tell the software your machine limits, and choose a tool from your real inventory. Then pick a strategy. Roughing digs out the bulk of the waste quickly. Finishing takes the smooth final surface with a lighter pass. For most flat work, climb milling gives the cleaner edge on a rigid machine.

The feeds and speeds are where machines earn their keep. The spindle speed and the feed rate work together as a chip load: how much material each flute actually bites. Too slow and you rub and burn the tool. Too fast and you stall or break the bit.

For local hardwoods - sal and sisau, or a good birch ply - most single-flute and two-flute bits cut clean around eighteen thousand rpm with a modest feed you tune up from a safe start. For aluminum, the rules tighten: a lower rpm, a slower feed, a sharper bit, and almost no depth of cut, because aluminum wants to grab and weld itself to the tool.

Here is the honest formula we use: run your first pass in the air, well above the material, and watch the machine move through the whole toolpath before you let it touch the stock. That one habit saves more tooling than any other tip in this series.

In the next episode we put that pipeline to use on something worth cutting - a traditional Newari motif.