Curve vs FF

[[Da...]]

We're going to be investing in some Curve licenses and got offered a Curve/FF bundle option.  What's the difference between Curve and FreeForm?

For some context, we have one Curve license now that we've been utilizing more in recent months.  We're also considering a CMM outfitted with a LineScan for surface profile inspections.

[[Ma...]]

I may not know exactly what is possible without FF, but i know you can use 2D and 3D curves to evaluate line profile.

With FF you can create surface feature and do scan paths on selected faces of a model.
Also you can recall all measured points into this feature and select which faces should be evaluated.

In other words - curves has nominals inside them - FF is using model for calculations.

We were told ( forged parts ) we absolutelly need curves and ff.

[[Ke...]]

If you do a lot of surface profiles, I would definitely get the FreeForm option. In my experience, pretty much everything is doable without it, but it saves a lot of time for evaluations that cover multiple features.

[[Ri...]]

I am a yuge FreeForm fan.

I put that shlt on everything.

😁

[[Je...]]

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, I'm curious to hear more about the second part of your post, the LineScan for profile strategy.

If appropriate, what type of parts and materials are you planning to inspect with a LineScan?  Have you had a chance to converse with Zeiss about the application of this laser line scanner on your parts?

Thanks for sharing about this.

[[Da...]]

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Glad I got them to invest in the FF option.

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We have a family of steel and aluminum parts that have full surface profiles all around the exterior.  We've been comparing various vision systems from other manufacturers and even ATOS, and some of our guys saw the hybrid probe/vision CMMs at IMTS which pointed us this direction.

[[Je...]]

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, thanks for sharing.

Multisensor metrology is an outstanding pairing to the part geometries you mentioned.

As far as LineScan and ATOS, I encourage you to carefully investigate their ability to scan steel and aluminum, especially if you don't want to have to spray your parts before measuring them.

You may also want to consider a DotScan sensor mounted on a Contura or similar CMM. The chromatic confocal sensor handles shiny parts well and scans very fast.  It excels at surface profiles.