Relief carving and mill tooling

[kbaegis]

Purchased a power-route XL and I was hoping to do some detailed relief carvings. I’ve started out with some pre-generated STL files off of etsy: www.etsy.com/listing/911589519/the-world-map-3d-stl-model-cnc-router?ref=hp_opfy-1&pro=1

Mostly I was wondering how to get fusion360 to generate toolpaths for the finer features. I can work fine with a 6mm ball endmill, but anything smaller than that it will not generate toolpaths as the predefined toolheads are set exclusively for drill operations rather than milling. If I were to drop down to a 1.5mm carbide endmill, does anyone know how I can get fusion360 to recognize it for milling operations rather than just making holes here and there?

[oldtech]

When importing an STL file Fusion will represent it as a mesh body which most fusion tools cannot work with. So first you need to convert the mesh body to a BRep body. So right click on the imported STL meshbody in the browser of Fusion and choose Mesh to BRep.

You should now be able to generate tool paths now using the 3D operations with smaller end mills. I would start with the contour or spiral 3D tool. Note that toolpath generation may be slow and generated large GRBL files. You will need to experiment and I would do it by using only a small section of the model you have downloaded.

[kbaegis]

The STLs I bought are too complex to convert into brep. It states that there are over 5.2 million facets. The best I’ve been able to do without crashing fusion has been to scale the mesh down and then go straight to CAM.

* pasteboard.co/JVMOUiS.jpg

[oldtech]

Then I'd use the modify mesh tools to remesh, reduce, or smooth the mesh before converting it to a BRep. With that many faces Fusion is going to have difficulty generating toolpaths and the toolpaths will be large and take a long time to cut. 

[Bruce]

You might be able to use Meshmixer to edit the STL file also.