3Shape and Planmill 40 - setting up jobserver connection?

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Messerschmidt

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Hey, long time lurker here, first time poster. I've been working with a Planmeca system (Planmill 40, NEVO intraoral scanner, DesignStudio) for several years for chairside crowns and am transitioning to bench work, doing almost entirely emax CAD as far as crowns go. I have myself a 3Shape installation and E3 scanner now, and my current sticking point is getting 3Shape to export to the mill. I have the jobserver software set up on a dedicated PC, but I'm unsure how to configure 3Shape to send an STL to this computer and 3Shape support doesn't know either. Anyone have experience with this?

I'm pretty tech savvy and have the scanner working and the mill milling from DesignStudio, but this link is the only thing eluding me.
 
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Sevan P

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Hey, long time lurker here, first time poster. I've been working with a Planmeca system (Planmill 40, NEVO intraoral scanner, DesignStudio) for several years for chairside crowns and am transitioning to bench work, doing almost entirely emax CAD as far as crowns go. I have myself a 3Shape installation and E3 scanner now, and my current sticking point is getting 3Shape to export to the mill. I have the jobserver software set up on a dedicated PC, but I'm unsure how to configure 3Shape to send an STL to this computer and 3Shape support doesn't know either. Anyone have experience with this?

I'm pretty tech savvy and have the scanner working and the mill milling from DesignStudio, but this link is the only thing eluding me.
If you just want 3shape to export a design file is stl format to a certain location you would need to set that up in the control panel by simply changing the output directory.

Open up the control panel and enter the system settings. Scroll down till you see Data output directories. The Manufacturing output directory field is what you want to alter. If it is a network shared folder then navigate to that folder that the you want the stl files to go to. This will be the location that your mill will pick them up from. like so.
stl output.jpg

Uncheck both boxes if you simply want all the stl file to just dump into one folder. Otherwise the way i have it it will output each stl file into a folder of the material used like Emax or Zirconia and the name of the material selected in the order form.

Now for the stl format you want to make sure you selected MFG process has the stl.dll selected as its output. That will be located under the site settings> Manufactured process. Select the process you are using for the design, like so.
dll.jpg

The press select if it is not already set as CADOutputRawSTL.dll then select update like so.
dll stl.jpg

Then save and exit the CP and save again. Now after each design is complete 3shape Dental System will export a stl of the designed filed to location you specified above. Now hopefully your mill software will see the newest file and grab it and mill.

I have our 3shape export the STL file onto the Mills CAM pc and then i can import them from there. I run 4 mills and it is super easy for me as all the file export into the material folder i will be cutting them out of. I hope this helps you on what you wanted.

There is alsoa milling machines section in the control panel but honestly i never ever played with it. Maybe that might be what your looking to do as well.
 
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Thanks! That helps a lot. I had found the milling machines section of the control panel but not the output directories. I think it will involve a bit of both to get the Planmill working, but I'm closer now. I'll poke Planmeca and see if they can explain to me how their jobserver software pulls in STL's.
 
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Ha, well, that was fruitless. The phone agent flat out denied it was possible without their Romexis practice management software. I know that's not true because their own DesignStudio software can do it entirely independent of Romexis already, and I've seen other labs doing it through ExoCAD. If anyone here has any wisdom please pass it on, otherwise I'll be looking through DesignStudio's settings to see how it exports.
 

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