PathPilot™ has been out of beta for nearly four months, and we’re quite proud of our new control software. While we expected PathPilot to improve the lives of our customers, there were a few features that we weren’t expecting to have such an impact. Here’s our top six list of our favorite (somewhat) unexpected advantages with PathPilot, in no particular order:
Responsiveness
While this wasn’t a profound surprise, we have been awed by the boost in confidence with Tormach users’ machine operation. Customers have been telling us about their lowered inhibitions to trying new operations, thanks to the responsiveness of PathPilot.
We Can Fix It
This was part of the inspiration for PathPilot’s creation, so again, not a big surprise. But, we have been quite surprised by the reaction from the Tormach community. Users are excited by the fact that we can make updates and respond to bugs so quickly. Having the ability to respond to community feedback also allows us to gauge the value of upcoming features and updates.
Music of Machining
According to many customers – and thanks to the real-time computations that are happening in the PathPilot controller – our mills sound better while machining. The pulse stream coming from the new hardware provides a steadier step-by-step connection with the machine tool – three orders of magnitude better, actually – creating a smoother, more stable machining process.
Bug Patrols
Since we brought our control software in-house with PathPilot, we expected bug fixes and adjustments to happen faster, but we didn’t expect the outpouring of support from the Tormach community in bug discovery and feature tweaks. The public bug tracker has been a tremendous help in identifying potential bugs faster and verifying the need for changes in a digi-democratic fashion.
Soft Limits
With the implementation of PathPilot, the interaction between the controller and the machine tool has vastly improved, allowing tighter controls on soft limits and providing a higher standard of precision and safety. While this wasn’t unexpected, we are pretty happy about how it turned out.
Going on Intuition
While we made an effort to design PathPilot with a user-friendly interface, we didn’t expect a resounding nod from the machining community. Both new users and veterans have gushed about how intuitive our new interface is. While we’ll continue to make updates and improvements (feature-creep is real!), we’ve taken a lot of pride in getting things done smoothly, right out of the gate. What are your favorite features of PathPilot?
