Job panel
When you create a new nesting job, or open an existing nesting job from a file, the job panel is displayed at the top of the screen:
The job panel has several tabs, and you can access them with shortcut keys as shown in the table below.
| Tab | Shortcut Key | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
Job |
I |
Edit the job settings (material, LTT etc) |
S |
View the list of sheets, add or remove sheets |
|
P |
View the list of parts, add or remove parts |
|
L |
View the layouts computed by the nesting engine |
|
U |
View a summary of the entire nest |
Job tab
The job tab displays some the information that was entered in the New Job dialog, and provides some more settings for the nesting engine to use while computing the nest.
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Techology: You can select a different LTT to use (for the specified machine, material and thickness). The LTTs that are most frequently used are listed first, and are tagged with a star icon.
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Parts distance: This setting is used to specify the minimum allowable distance between parts (also known as the bridge width) during nesting.
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Start corner: Specifies the corner of the sheet from which the nesting will start.
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Allow nesting in holes: If turned on, small parts will be nested inside the holes of larger parts, where possible.
-
Spread out parts on last layout with no remainder: If this is turned on, then Flux will take the last sheet of the nest that has insufficient space left to be used as a remainder sheet, and will spread out the parts on that sheet to minimize heat dissipation problems (since there is no reduction in nesting efficiency anyway).
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Avoid placing thin long parts along slats: If turned on, long and thin parts will be placed across the support slats rather than along them, to minimize the risk of the parts falling in between the slats.
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Minimize number of different layouts: If turned on, Flux will try to repeat layouts multiple times (within the constraints on required part quantity) to minimize the number of different layouts created.
Changing material / machine
You can click on the Change material/machine link in the Job tab to change the machine and the material used for nesting. This will re-tool all the parts with for the new machine and material and redo the nest. Clicking this link brings up a dialog like the one below, where you can enter the new settings: