Nesting

The Nesting (ANst) command is designed for automatically nesting flat parts on rectangular sheets of material. These programs are typically called "Cutting" for cutting optimization, and "Nesting" for milling. The program requests 3D solids, determines their dimensions, groups the parts, and places their nested copies on the sheets, taking into account gaps, material dimensions, and grain direction. As a result, you will receive neat nesting maps in the form of nested 3D solids or flat outlines of the parts.

This command is especially useful when designing products from sheet materials: furniture, facades, plywood and plastic products, and sheet metal cutting. The program will help you calculate how many sheets of material are needed, and is useful for cutting on a circular saw or CNC router.

Program features:

• Use parts directly from your model, without prior layout in the XY plane.

• Find parts within assembly blocks. Process parts from arrays and external references. 

• Filter parts by material, technology, layers, and other properties.

• Multiply the number of parts to produce a series of identical products.

• Create mirror copies of parts for mirrored assembly blocks.

• Take sheet material dimensions from material properties or from the Nesting program settings.

• Create separate sheet groups for different materials. So, with just one program call you will get cutting for all materials at once.

• Rotate parts on a sheet to optimize nesting, but do not rotate parts if the material has a specified grain direction.

• Customize which side of the parts will be laid out and how they will be rotated relative to the standard layout.

• Use windows and through-cutouts in parts to accommodate small parts. So nesting is implemented.

• Create custom headers on parts and for each sheet group.

• Outline each sheet group with a frame.

• All gaps are customizable—from the sheet edge, between parts, and between sheets.

• Delete original solids after successful nesting. 

• Transfer parts to the contour preparation process for subsequent CNC machining (requires a separate license).

• Quickly switch between multiple saved nesting styles.

Downloading and Paying for a License

Read about downloading and installing the program here.

To run the plugin, you will have to register an account and top up your account balance or receive bonuses. 

Then you can activate one of the licenses:

• Annual license - 20 EUR.

• Unlimited license - 100 EUR. Free updates for 1 year.

• The trial period is 20 days.

The Nesting command is also included in the set A>V>C> Pro.

Program Limitations

• The program is extremely simplified and cannot compete with professional cutting and nesting programs. For professional work, it is still recommended to use Export to DXF and then import contours into professional programs.

• Currently, only one simple "Shelf" (= Skiline) nesting method is implemented. More advanced methods are planned for later development, subject to sponsorship.

• The program does not currently work with parts depicted as polylines or regions. However, this option may be added in the future.

• The program does not check whether parts fit within the sheet thickness. Carefully configure the grouping conditions.

• The program does not currently combine the contours of a single part into a separate block or group.

• Currently, there is no direct export of contours to DXF files; the results are always output to the same drawing from which the model was taken.

• The program does not generate any tables, cutting tables, or lists of sawing operations.

• The program is not yet adapted for cutting moldings, pipes, profiles, and rods. Use sheet materials only.

• The program doesn't limit the number of sheets; it depends only on the number of parts.

• The program doesn't create or use a scrap list.

• The program doesn't name parts. You must name or number the parts before calling the cutting program. Use the Numbering (AvcNum) and A>V>C> Properties Palette (AvcPalette) programs. Separate licenses are required.

• You can prepare a part header (part label) block with the necessary attributes in advance. However, the program can also do without these blocks and create regular MText. An example of the Part Label block can be found in the template LayoutTemplateMM.dwt.

• Create a model of your product, where each part is a 3D solid. The program does not work with 2D contours, regions, surfaces, polygonal meshes, etc. However, you can combine parts into assembly blocks and insert these assemblies into the model multiple times. Mirror blocks can be used, but blocks cannot be scaled. Scaled blocks and dynamic blocks with surfaces instead of solids must be converted to regular blocks in advance using the AsmNew command.

• Assign a material to the solids. In the material properties, specify the sheet dimensions and, if necessary, the presence of a texture. This sheet data will be used by the Nesting program. You can use colors, layers, etc., instead of materials, but then you will have to carefully reconfigure the grouping, and only one sheet size will be available – the default size.

• Give your parts numbers or names. Use the Numbering (AvcNum) and A>V>C> Properties Palette (AvcPalette) programs. Separate licenses are required.

• Open the Options Palette in the Nesting tab and configure all program options. You can configure up to 9 settings styles and quickly switch between them.

• You don't need to call the Lay program; the nesting program will automatically lay out all the parts in the XY plane using the same rules.

• Run the nesting command. You can type Nesting from the keyboard. If another program already uses this name, there is also the alias ANst.

• You can select parts and assemblies in the model before calling the command.

• If nothing is selected when you call the command, the program will prompt you to select solids and block assemblies.

• During the prompt, keywords are available:

  • SwitchStyle - quickly switch between 9 settings sets by their number.

  • TUNE - opens the settings dialog.

• After selecting the parts, you must specify the nesting insertion point. This point is projected onto the XY plane of the world coordinate system. The upper left corner of the entire nest will be inserted at this point.

• Optionally, the program may also request a multiplier for creating batches of identical products. The number of parts will be multiplied by this number.

• The program will begin. First, a table of all parts will be created in RAM. Then, the parts will be grouped into groups, and all parts in a single group will be nested together on a single sheet.

• Each group will have a header and frame.

• New groups for other materials will be created to the right (shifted positively in the X direction).

• One of the nesting methods will be called for the parts in each group separately. Currently, only the Skyline method is used. This will result in one or more sheets filled with parts.

• An outline (polyline) will be created for each sheet. The layer of this polyline is configured in the NC preparation (even if outlines are disabled).

• Additional sheets of the same material will be created below (shifted negatively in the Y direction).

• Each part will be laid out in the XY plane according to the Layout rules and then moved to the desired location on the sheet.

• A label will be created above each part: text or a block with the part's name. The labels will be raised in the Z axis above the thickest part.

• All headings and frames will be created on the Info layer. You can configure the properties of this layer in your DWT template.

• Once nesting is complete, the NC Preparation program can be called to create part outlines. Please note that the outlines will be created taking into account the rotation of the parts on the sheet, and the disk angles will vary on different rotations of the part. A separate NC Preparation license is required.

• If deletion of original parts is configured, the program will delete all model space solids that were successfully laid out.

• Finally, the program will report any unnested parts (larger than the sheet). Information about nesting efficiency—the ratio of the area of ​​the parts to the area of ​​all sheets (except the remainder of the last sheet)—will also be displayed in the command line.

• Pay close attention to the command line messages—they'll detail what the program is doing and any problems it encountered.

Skyline (Shelf) Nesting Method

For optimal nesting of parts on a sheet, the simple and fast Skyline Shelf Nesting method is used. The algorithm first sorts the parts from largest to smallest and then simply lays them out in rows along the long edge of the sheet. A sequence of horizontal sections—"shelves"—is formed, onto which the parts are placed.

The advantage of this method is that it is always possible to cut parts on a circular saw, as there are through-cuts along the entire sheet. However, the algorithm does have some drawbacks. The most important one is that it only works with rectangular parts. All your parts will be considered simple rectangles.

To improve nesting, the following features have been added to this algorithm:

• The program attempts to lay out the part not only with the long edge along the sheet but also with the long edge facing the sheet. No other rotations except 90 degrees are used. However, rotations will be blocked if the material has a texture (grain).

• The program searches for empty spaces at the end of each strip of parts and above each low-lying part in a row. Subsequent parts are placed in these spaces.

• The program can optionally search for through-holes (windows) and cutouts in parts, as well as empty areas of complex-shaped parts. Filling such spaces with other parts makes through-cutting impossible on a circular saw. The program also considers windows to be rectangular—this is a fundamental problem with the algorithm.

• The program re-nests small parts from the last sheet into the remaining empty spaces of the first sheets.

After all these improvements, the sheet fill rate reaches very respectable values, over 90% for large nests with small parts.

More complex nesting methods can be programmed later, once there are willing donors for this work.

Part Label

The program can create a label with a name and dimensions on each part. A name must be defined for each part in advance. You can change the label template and configure the substitution of any solid and drawing properties. The program can create text or a block as a label. Details on label settings are available here. A special feature of part labels is that they are always placed in the center of the part. You cannot configure the program to create labels above or below the part. The label size depends on the configured text height, but the program will reduce the label if it does not fit within the part's dimensions. If the program nests small parts within the windows of larger parts, it will search for free space on the part where there are no other parts. The label can then be further reduced. If contouring is not enabled, all labels will be raised in Z coordinates above the thickest part.

Selected Objects Filter

Filtering is necessary to discard drawing objects that accidentally fall within the selection frame. It's easier to simply select all model objects and let the program select only the required ones. Furthermore, there's no other way to select the required solids if they're inside assembly blocks.

This also enables searching for parts within assembly blocks and counting the number of these blocks in the drawing. You can read more about filtering on the Data Table page.

Default Sheet

The sheet size is used for parts that:

• have no material assigned (Global material);

• have no sheet dimensions specified in the material settings;

• have grouping configured incorrectly and have parts with different materials and sizes in the same group.

If you don't assign materials to solids, all parts will be nested on sheets with the size specified here. You'll need to create several different nesting styles for different sheet sizes and run the program multiple times.

• Length - The default sheet length. Dimensions are entered in the current drawing units.

• Width - The default sheet width.

• Grain/Texture - Specifies that the sheet material has a grain or texture direction. Enabling this option prevents parts from being rotated across the sheet.

Gap

The distance between adjacent parts. Enter the saw blade thickness or the cutter diameter here. The value can be zero.

Sheet Edge gap

The distance from the outermost parts to the sheet boundary. The offset is the same on all sides of the sheet. Use this if the sheets have chipped coating on the edges. The value can be zero.

Sheet Space

The distance between adjacent sheets and between groups of sheets in the drawing. This is a purely decorative setting.

Nesting Method

In the current version of the program, this option is hidden. Only a simple shelf nesting algorithm (Skyline) is used.

Start Corner

Sets the point from which the program begins nesting parts on the sheet. Accordingly, empty spaces (material scraps) will remain on the opposite corner. This setting is independent of the Y-axis rotation of the sheet length.

The following settings concern the way parts are laid out on the XY plane.

Lay the front

The program searches for the biggest side on each part (front, facade) and lays it out according to this setting:

• Front Up.

• Front Down.

• By Technology — select the side based on the part's technological settings.

Along Y

Normally, the program lays out sheets and parts with the long edge aligned with the X axis. However, for some machines, you can enable this option, and the finished sheets with parts will be rotated with the length aligned with the Y axis and the width aligned with the X axis. The Skyline nesting method works regardless of this option and always nests in strips along the long edge of the material.

Flip

Rotates parts 180 degrees around the Z axis relative to the standard layout. This is used in organizations where the only edge banding of the part should be at the top, not the bottom. 

Find Windows

Search for through windows and cutouts in parts for nesting small parts. The search process can significantly slow down the cutting process, so it is recommended to disable this option if the parts do not have windows. Do not use the window search if you want to retain the ability to saw through cuts across the entire sheet.

Contours (NC Preparation)

After nesting, calls a separate paid program for preparing part contours, CNC Preparation. This program replaces 3D solids with their flat casts—contours with layer names describing the manufacturing technology, depth parameters, and so on. Since contouring occurs after nesting optimization, the parts are already rotated exactly as they will be cut. For example, you won't have to change the wheel tilt angles in your machine's CAM program.

Delete source solids

Deletes original solids after nesting. Blocks are not deleted. Only solids from the model are deleted, not from assembly blocks. Parts that failed to nest are not deleted. Recommended if you previously created a nesting nest and no longer need copies of the parts.

Multiplication request

Ask for the part quantity multiplier each time the command is run. For example, if the model contains one part and the multiplier is 10, ten copies of the part will be included in the nesting. This parameter is convenient for cutting batches of identical items. The multiplier can be specified in the Properties Palette without this query—it is stored in the drawing properties.

Convert number to string.

When a program finds a substitution and replaces it with an object property, it needs to know how to format numbers and how many characters to write. It is possible to write the format into each substitution. But if you did not specify the format in the substitution, then these settings will be used.

Format for size

This setting is used only for converting size numbers to a string. It does not apply to areas, volumes, prices, and other figures. The format can always be overridden in the substitution itself. The format is ignored when substituting AutoCAD fields.

The format specifies how many decimal places to write and whether to write insignificant zeros. Use the characters 0 and # in the format. 

• 0 is a digit or 0, 

• # is a digit or nothing.

For example, the number 1.111111 formatted as 00.00 will be displayed as 01.11. 

Formatted 0.#### will be displayed as 1.1111. 

And the number 1.0034 formatted as 0.## will be displayed as 1.

There are special, AutoCAD-only, formats:

• CU – Current: how the units are configured in the current drawing (via the _units dialog)

• AR – Architectural

• EN – Engineering

• FR – Fractional

After AR, EN, and FR, you can write precision (0-8) 

Decimal separator

Replace the decimal point with this character in all numbers and in all substitutions. 

Use Fields

Use AutoCAD Fields instead of substituting property values. 

Allow Symbols

Use special characters such as ¼, ¾, ½. And after the corners, prices, areas, and volumes, units of measurement will be affixed. It is impossible to evaluate mathematical expressions with such symbols. And not all fonts contain these characters.

Program settings are saved in the Windows registry, under the current user's registry key. Therefore, they will work consistently across all drawings and all versions of AutoCAD and BricsCAD. Settings can only be transferred to another computer by exporting the registry key. For this purpose, the A>V>C> Options Palette features buttons for exporting and importing settings.