Nesting a large job

[Todd Stradling]

I have a job that has about 120 cabinets. When I try to nest it in eCabinets, it goes for a while then sais "not responding". I am trying to be patient but after a couple of hours I figure something is wrong.
Is there a limit to the number of cabinets I can have in one job?

[Damon Nabors]

Try nesting in multiple batches. It could be that the file size is too large.

[Jody Wilmes]

I recommend doing multiple batches as well. Not only will it help out with the nesting speed, you won't have tons of labels/nests to print all at once. Writing the CNC will speed up also.

[Damon Nabors]

Another reason to batch in smaller clusters is to save time in assembly. I would batch those cabinets in groups of around 20 so that as they come off the router, they can be sorted and put together. If you have a 120 cabinet job, you may be bottle necked until that last sheet comes off because you may have parts for one cabinet scattered anywhere from the first sheet to the last and then your assembly is shut down until they receive all the cabinet parts.

Just my 2cents.

[Georgi Baltov]

Todd,

you got in the same trouble as I did a couple of months ago. I had about 140 sheets cut at once. It was a dumb mistake as I should have split the job in at least 3 separate batches.

The machine took about 3 hours to load and nest the job and another 3 hours to write the CNC file. The software is working and it's calculating but it's doing so in a very slow way. It almost seems like it's not doing anything. That's why we usually loose out patience and just close it from the task manager. At that point you have to do the whole thing all over again.

The best thing is to split the job as the other guys advised. At the end you win because you didn't wait all this time while the machine was down generating nest and code.

[Todd Stradling]

Thanks Guys! It makes sense to split the job up into batches when you are ready to cut the job. I deffinatly will. I was at the beginning of the process though. I was trying to figure material quantities for the entire job. I'll just split it into batches then add the material quantities.
Thanks again!

[Wally Schneeberger]

Thanks Guys! It makes sense to split the job up into batches when you are ready to cut the job. I deffinatly will. I was at the beginning of the process though. I was trying to figure material quantities for the entire job. I'll just split it into batches then add the material quantities.
Thanks again!

Make sure that you nest each batch before you take the quantities that you require. Then your numbers will be right.