INTEGRATION OF CAD AND CAM SYSTEM USING MACROFUNCTION

The macrofunction in the computer aided manufacturing (CAM) system is executed based on the macrocode which is transformed by a series of op erations input by the user. By the use of this function, operations wh ich should be performed by the user can be simplified. Therefore, if t he transformation from mechanical drawings to NC code can be changed d irectly into macrocode, NC machining can be achieved easily. In our st udy, a function for transforming macrocode from data of CAD drawing to CAM data is developed. However, drawing data of a CAD system (''CAD-d rawing'') does not always coincide with drawing data of a CAM system ( ''CAM-drawing''), because in a CAM system, restricted conditions, such as machining conditions, must be considered. Consequently, drawing da ta must be represented by a structure and function which include infor mation about restricted conditions. Thus, the concept of the relations hip between ''master and servant'' for definitely expressing structure and function in an object model is specifically incorporated. As a re sult, even in the case where structure and function are changed, the k nowledge base can be consistently maintained. This paper describes rep resentation of knowledge in the knowledge base and method for generati ng a macrocode using the knowledge base.