Expert: J. B. Borge - 8/31/2005

Question
I actually have 3 questions, but you can answer any of them or all of them if you wish.  
First, I have both AutoCAD 2002/2005 and Solidworks 2004/2005 which we use at work.  We lost our CAD programmer today and they need some things done that only he knew how to do.  We use CAD to make drawings for parts made on our table router. Anyhow, When I insert text into a drawing I need to know how to convert the text to lines so that I can create a toolpath around the lines. (We make signs for county parks out of plastic on the router and need to mill images and text).  I'm not sure if they would be vector lines or polylines or whatnot.
Question 2, I need to be able to open an image and trace the outline of an image in order to make a toolpath around that image.  Along the same lines as question 1 but not entirely sure how to do that. We have CorelDRAW and number of other software titles that I'm not too familiar with, but if any of those could be of use let me know and I'll look into it.
Third and final question, I need to know about nesting.  We have a copy of Router-CIM which is supposed to be able to do AutoNesting but I'm not familiar with how to use it.  I need to be able to take a drawing for a part and input the stock material size to have it automatically place parts with true positioning to get the maximum amount of parts out of a piece of material.
I am relatively new to CAD so detailed information would be much appericiated, and Thank You in advance for any help you may be able to provide for me.

Answer
Hi Paul, to convert text to polylines in autocad, you will have to use one of Express Tool's command. Have this tool loaded in your machine if u haven't yet (Should be available in your Autocad installation CD). Once installed, from your pull down menu, click Express\Text\Explode Text.

Converting an image to a vector file in autocad - the easiest way to do this is to use a software called 'Scan2Cad', instead of tracing. This type of software is a raster to vector converter which will try to convert pixel based image into data which autocad can understand.  There's a downloadable trial version at http://www.softcover.com/ There are many other converters available so you might wanna evaluate best one that fit your needs.

I'm not familiar w/ Autonesting nor had any exposure w/ Router-CIM.

If you have any other questions, i'd be more than glad to help...good luck!

-JB