The second way to generate the honeycomb pattern is to select the Laser Mode Tooling instead of the Punching Mode Tooling. Unlike the Punching Mode Tooling that required you to create and import each tool, we only need to create and import the largest tool shape. This tool can be an ideal or non-ideal tool shape. The limitation of this mode is that we can only use a single tool shape and cannot be mixed with other tool shapes. However, the advantage is flexibility as we can generate up to 250 tools with different size based on only 1 tool shape. In doing so, we only need to specify the total number of tools to be used and the minimum parameter of the tool, either Height, Width or diameter.
The first thing we need to do if we want to use Laser Mode Tooling is to identify the tool dimension. The dimensions that we required are the width, the height and the maximum circle that enclosed the tool shape from the origin point (0,0). By using one of these three dimensions, we can generate a range of tools based on the minimum and maximum value. The illustration below is the dimensions of the largest tool of 6 segment pattern subtype that is used in Punching Mode Tooling previously. The width is 15.00mm, the height is 12.99mm and the maximum diameter is 17.32mm.
As we knew the dimension for the largest tool, we can use one of these dimensions to generate a tool set for honeycomb pattern by specifying the total number of tool variation and the minimum dimension. For the honeycomb pattern we are going to generate, the maximum diameter will be 17.32mm, then type 30 for the total tools and the minimum diameter will be 7.5mm.
As this tool is an ideal tool, we can simply check the box for Auto Inscribed Diameter Calculation.
For other parameters, we use the default and set the minimum gap to be 3.0mm. The illustration below is the pattern result after the Generate button is clicked. As we use more tool variation (30 tools in Laser Mode, compared to 7 tools in Punching Mode) the final result looks better and smooth.
If we are going to use a non-ideal tool shape for the largest tool in Laser Tooling Mode, we also need to know the dimension of its ideal tool shape for calculating the inscribed diameter to generate the honeycomb pattern grid. For the 6 segments pattern subtype, we need to know the ideal maximum diameter that enclosed the tool shape. For this example, we are going to use the 6th tool that is actually derived from the 7th too.
From the illustration below, the Maximum Diameter that we are going to use to calculate the honeycomb grid is 17.32mm.
However, The Maximum Diameter that we are going to use to generate the selection of tool is 15.32mm. In other words, this is the true maximum diameter that enclosed the non-ideal tool shape.
And for the Minimum diameter value, we can use any value that less than the maximum diameter. For this example, we use 10.00mm as the minimum Diameter as illustrated below.
For other parameters, we use the default and set the minimum gap to be 3.0mm. The total tool in between the maximum and minimum will be 30 tools. The illustration below is the pattern result after the Generate button is clicked.
As we can see below, there is only 1 non-ideal tool shape to generate the pattern, but there will be 30 different size and the final result look good and unique because of the non-ideal shape instead of simple triangle shape.
