hi!
At present, a lot of industrial production is moving towards data-based production. The output format used by the cutting machine and various model printers is PLT format. There are more users of rhinoceros as software biased towards industrial design. The official should pay attention to this development trend and support the direct output of this format![PLT test file.rar|attachment]
At present, users need to export and convert data again with various other software. As rhinoceros users for many years, we hope to add the support of this format, which will make the rhinoceros user experience better
As far as I can tell, we’ve had 3 request for this file format in the last 15 year. I’ve added your request to RH-2399 and we will continue monitoring demand for this format.
-wim
PLT is an antique format intended for plotters, I used it last back in school in the 90s. There’s not really much demand for this. Just printing to a HPGL printer file will give you a PLT file, I learned that trick back in school in the 90s.
Industrial cutting machines, cutting machines, plotters, etc. need to be used, because rhinoceros does not support direct export of this format, but it is converted with other software. With the addition of rhinoceros subdivision modeling, the workflow to complete the whole process with rhinoceros accounts for more, so I hope to add the request of this format!
The typical “universal” file format for 2D cutting is DXF which supports arcs, circles, and lines.
PLT format uses line segments only, and any arcs and circles will be translated to lots of small lines segments.
This is inefficient and may cause problems including slower cutting speed and increased wear and tear on the machine.
HPGL2 does support arcs, circles and lines however, support for HPGL2 is extremely limited and typically is no longer offered in many CAD applications.
It might be time to start thinking about upgrading 30+ years old hardware and software, or choose a service that has done so.
Because this format has been operated by many machinery and software companies for many years, it is difficult to change the fact. In addition, it is more necessary to use it now
You can try @JimCarruthers suggestion and see if the HPGL format will work.
Inkscape (free) can save HPGL files but I have no idea of that will work for you, give it a try!
You may need to change the extension to .PLT to get it to work in your applications.
Hpgl would be Great¡. At the universitz that I work at we have several machines using it. the onlz problem at the moment is that we have to run Rhino 5 and windows XP to be able to control them.
@wim There are a lot more than five people who’d want this. I’m struggling with a Win95-themed 2D CAD app, whilst wishing I could do it in Rhino.
All of your jewelry customers use PLT files in-house. Virtually all of our engraving machines require PLT files, from 40-year-old gantry dragsters to 5-year-old gantry dragsters to new fiber laser galvos. I’m guessing our glorified rebranders bought a perpetual redistribution license back in the 90s. You’d think with a 10x markup, they could afford the upgrade…
