bcnc The Swiss Army Knife

 Having some sarcastic fun in this post.  I like bcnc and use it regularly.

As useful as bcnc is, it is unusual.  It's sort of like a conventional cnc control under the influence of psychedelic drugs.  The same is true of many of it's features.  What other cnc software has pyrography or plays stepper music as standard features ?  None !  The homely tkinter interface only adds to the charm.  The documentation isn't poor,  it's non-existent.  Okay,  in fairness the wiki does have some information.

In the last post I mentioned the bcnc editor and how useful it can be.  While making the sign in the previous post Adaptive Clearing couldn't do the last step efficiently.  Choosing "Clearing" as the option in "Operation Type" cut the entire surface when only some profiles were needed.  Choosing the Adaptive Clearing "Profile" option  was going to damage the sign.  The "Clearing" path includes profile passes but how to extract only these passes from the huge g-code file ?  Surprisingly it's not very difficult.

** Make a backup of any file before opening in bcnc.

** If a file is large it may be necessary to increase the timeout found at the top right of the bcnc graphics window.

 When a g-code file is loaded into the bcnc editor it breaks the program into blocks.  The image below shows a very dense Adaptive tool path in the bcnc back plot.

   This type of file will take a while to load.  If timeout is too short it won't load completely.

This is the block editor panel.  A block containing 16 lines of code has been expanded to display it's contents.  The numbers in the square brackets indicate the number of lines of code in each block.  The editor seems to split the text into another block every time a rapid retract is called.  As long as all the rapid retracts move to a safe height it's okay to delete, re-order,  or duplicate any of these blocks in most cases.  99 times out of 100 ?

 

 

 

When a block is selected in the block editor it is highlighted in blue in the back plot.  Conversely clicking on a path in the back plot highlights the corresponding block in the block editor.  Expanding a block in the editor allows the selection of single lines of code. Knowing that the adaptive profile passes  are near the end of the program helps to find them quickly.

It's also possible to select, un-select, duplicate, toggle visibility and manipulate the blocks in a number of other ways.  My best advice is to spend some time playing with these options.  Some edit actions take a bit of time to complete so don't assume nothing is happening when there's no visible activity on the screen.

The back plot showing the selected blocks

     The paths and areas shown in blue are all that's been kept from the large Adaptive tool path.

Clicking on the copy icon will copy all the blocks that have been selected as indicated with an "x" in the block editor.  Use the File button on the top task bar but do not click on the floppy icon.  Click on the arrow beneath that icon to get a "save as" dialogue. Save as file type "G-Code clean".

This post only touches on some of the abilities of the bcnc editor.  It is a unique and powerful addition to a cnc toolbox.