CIMCO recently reorganized what comes with each tier of CIMCO Edit. Backplot simulation and the advanced NC editing functions, which used to require the top tier, are now standard in CIMCO Edit Core. In their place, the top tier picked up a full verification suite: collision detection, stock verification, and configurable stop conditions. That reshuffling is also why the top tier now goes by CIMCO Edit Ultra instead of Professional, but the name is the smaller part of the story. The bigger part is what has been added to the software now.
If you are running Ultra, here is what that verification suite covers and why it matters.
Collision Detection Between the Tool, the Holder, and the Workpiece
Backplot on its own shows you the tool moving through the toolpath. It does not tell you whether the holder above that tool is about to clip a fixture, and holder clearance is the collision most shops never budget for, because it never shows up in a standard toolpath view. A program can clear every visual check, tool clearing the part with room to spare, and still put a holder into a clamp on the first real cut.
Ultra’s Collision Settings check the tool, the holder, and the workpiece against each other in the same simulation pass. Tool/Workpiece Collisions can be scoped to rapid moves only, cutting moves only, both, or off entirely, since the tool is in near-constant contact with the workpiece during normal cutting and flagging every legitimate cut buries the report in noise. Cutter Allowance filters out false positives caused by the small margin of error in STL model geometry, so a tool that technically grazes a surface by a tenth of a millimeter does not register as a real collision. Collision Step Size controls how finely the simulation checks along the toolpath.
Stock Verification Settings
Collision Detection tells you when something touches something it should not. Stock Verification catches a quieter category of mistake: material removed the wrong way even without a hard collision. Refine Edges improves the precision of the stock model itself. Rapid Collisions flag material cut during a rapid move, almost always a programming error rather than an intended cut. The Stopped Spindle setting lets you decide what happens when the program cuts material with the spindle not turning: cut through and ignore it, refuse to cut, or cut but mark the result so it cannot be missed in review.
These are the mistakes that do not throw an obvious error. They do not show up until a part fails inspection or a tool breaks for a reason nobody can quite explain, which is exactly the kind of problem that is expensive to trace after the fact and nearly free to catch in simulation.
Configurable Stop Conditions
Collision Detection and Stock Verification are only useful if someone actually reviews what they flag, and Stop Conditions change how that review works. Instead of watching a full simulation from start to finish hoping to catch a problem, you can set the simulation to pause automatically on a collision, a tool change, a stopped-spindle cut, a holder-to-stock event, or an exceeded travel limit. Optional stops on M00, M01, M02, and M30 are available as well, useful for programs that rely on planned operator intervention partway through.
Reviewing a program becomes checking the handful of moments that actually got flagged instead of sitting through the whole cycle. On longer, more complex programs, that difference is not small. A programmer who used to commit real time to watching a full simulation now spends that time on the two or three moments the software actually flagged as worth a look.
Turning It On
None of this requires a new purchase or license conversion. Once you’ve installed the latest version and your license shows CIMCO Edit Ultra, Collision Settings and Stock Verification Settings are available in the Simulation tab, and Stop Conditions are configured from the Toolpath menu.
It is worth scoping these settings deliberately rather than leaving them at their most aggressive defaults. A collision check that flags every routine cutting pass gets switched off within a week out of frustration, which defeats the point. Set Tool/Workpiece Collisions to rapid moves only if that is your actual risk, add a small Cutter Allowance to cut down on model noise, and enable Stop Conditions for the specific events you actually want flagged.
We are publishing a series of articles over the coming weeks that walk through setting up each of these features in detail, from scoping collision detection correctly to configuring Stop Conditions for your specific programs.
Want to take a deeper look at these tools? Read our article, CIMCO Edit Ultra: New Verification Features Explained, for more detail on how Ultra’s new verification capabilities work and where Machine Simulation still fits.
Have Questions or Need Help?
Check out our CIMCO Edit product page for even more information.
If you want help dialing in these settings in for your machines and materials before then, we are glad to walk through it with you.
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