I plan to cut some pieces where the length and width are multiples of the thickness. Rather than make a new file for each thickness of wood, is there a way to use a variable that can be set to modify all sizes that are based on it?
The reason I ask is that many pieces of wood nominally 3mm in thickness can vary quite a bit and the dimensions for the pieces I want to cut are critical.
Thanks in advance.
You’re getting into the realms of parametric CAD there and sadly LightBurn doesn’t have this kind of functionality 
I use SolidWorks or Fusion for this kind of thing. It means you need to go through an export-import process but it might be the best way to go. If you want a free alternative to SW or Fusion you could try FreeCAD instead.
Hope this helps.
It may be a suggestion that doesn’t fit what you want, but I have the different thicknesses of the different materials in the “Library”.
Whenever I intend to use more than one parameter, I assign a new layer to the object and to that layer I assign the corresponding parameters through the library.
The library really doesn’t solve the issue… Lightburn was never designed to be parametric, because of that, I doubt it could be implemented without a complete re-write…
@Marcus_Wakefield suggestion is the best for this… I use FreeCad for doing this. Most of the time all of the work can be done in Lightburn, but if you doing modification of sizes, it’s likely a good call to move out of Lightburn… create it via one of the cad programs and then export the files (dxf or svg, even pdf) and import them into Lightburn…
It complicates the work steps, but it usually pays off in the end, if you’re changing these values around.
I have a flow meter, created the design in FreeCad, 3d printed the case and exported the svg file for the cover and cut it out with the co2… had to make screw size adjustments and rotate the object a bit… so it worked out fine.
Lightburn is always adding features… we can now change the slot size via Lightning for different thickness of materials…
Good luck
Thanks for all the responses. I had figured it was not a feature in Lightburn, but figured it wouldn’t hurt to ask. I do have Carbide Create which supports some simple variables that will do what I want and I can export SVG from it - I’;ll probably go that path. I do know how to use FreeCad, at least at a novice level and can make designs there, too, but I know Carbide Create better.
Use whatever you can drive and will export what Lightburn will import …
Good luck
This topic was automatically closed 30 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.
