Takshak CAM
Import a solid model. Takshak recognizes the machinable features and offers the right operation for each — from a STEP file to finished G-code, in 3-axis and 4-axis rotary.
What Takshak is
Takshak is a desktop CAM (computer-aided manufacturing) application for CNC milling. Import a solid model and it recognizes the machinable features automatically — holes, pockets, bosses, profiles, slots, cone cavities, fillets and chamfers — and offers the right operation for each. You confirm what it found, choose your tools, and Takshak generates and simulates the toolpaths you post to G-code.
It runs entirely on your own computer, on Windows and Linux. Your part geometry, projects, and toolpaths never leave your machine — there is no cloud, no telemetry, and after a one-time activation it works offline.
It is a 3-axis and single-rotary (4-axis) system — which already covers most of the machines on a job-shop floor.
It reads your part
Automatic feature recognition is the difference between Takshak and the affordable CAM below it. Instead of hand-placing every operation, you import the solid and Takshak reads its topology — grouping every machinable feature by its physical role and surfacing the operations that fit it. A round hole offers Drill and Bore; a cone cavity offers a helical ramp or a matched V-bit; a pocket offers clearing and a finish pass.
You work the way you think at the machine — by feature, not by dialog. Recognize, confirm, cut.
A full operation library
Takshak ships a complete set of 3-axis operations, organized the way AFR presents them — by the feature they machine. Every op enters cleanly, leaves stock for a finish pass where it should, and flags any single feature it can't machine instead of aborting the batch.
Holes & cone cavities
- Drill — peck-drills one or many identical holes on centreline in a single op, with chip-clearing pecks and an optional dwell.
- Bore — helically interpolates an endmill to open a hole to a target diameter wider than the cutter, with multi-pass moat clearing.
- Helical Ramp — spirals a standard endmill down a conical wall: countersinks, chamfered mouths, tapered seats.
- V-bit Plunge — forms the whole cone in one matched-angle plunge.
Faces, pockets & roughing
- Face — clears a flat top to depth, climb or conventional, plunge or helical entry.
- Pocket — clears a closed pocket to its floor with wall stock-to-leave and an optional finish pass.
- Adaptive clearing — constant-engagement high-speed roughing, whole-part or over a selected region — deep cuts, gentle on the tool.
- Ramp Pocket & Wall Finish — ramped pit clearing plus a dedicated wall-finishing pass.
- Plug Clear — clears the air around a standing plug or boss, straight or drafted walls, island-aware.
- Sloped Pocket — pockets with a sloped, non-flat floor.
- Rest machining — cleans up what a larger tool couldn't reach, staircase-aware on cones and drafted walls.
Profiles & contours
- Contour / Inside Contour — profile milling outside or inside a boundary, with lead-in/out and multiple passes.
- Arc Contour — arc-fitted profiles for smooth G2/G3 walls instead of faceted line segments.
- Open & manual chains — follow an open edge or a chain you pick by hand.
3D finishing
- Parallel — parallel-pass finishing across a 3D surface, whole-part or selected region, with true flat/ball/bull/tapered-ball contact.
- Scallop — constant-scallop finishing that holds an even cusp height across curvature.
- Z-level finishing — constant-Z waterline passes that finish steep walls level by level, whole-part or over a selected region.
- Pencil — cleans the internal corners a bigger finishing tool couldn't reach.
- Trace — 3D curve-follow along an edge or picked chain.
Fillets & chamfers
- Fillet (form or mill) — round an edge to a radius, formed by a matching tool or milled with a ball.
- Chamfer & V-groove (form or mill) — bevel an edge or cut a V-groove, formed by a chamfer/V tool or milled.
Thread milling
- Thread Mill — internal and external threads by helical interpolation, with a size dropdown and automatic internal/external detection from the picked face.
Slotting & undercuts
- T-Slot — disc-cutter undercut: pick the slot floor and Takshak cuts the tee into a pre-cut vertical slot, neck clearance checked.
- Dovetail — the angled-flank sibling, cut with a dovetail disc from the same pick.
4-axis rotary, done properly
Takshak drives a single rotary A-axis two ways. Indexed 3+1: lock the rotary axis at any angle and run any 3-axis operation on the exposed face — the full library above, on rotary stock. And true simultaneous 4-axis, where X, Y, Z and A move together on every cutting move.
Rotary operations
- Rotary drilling & boring — radial holes on the part.
- Rotary facing, grooving & OD steps — turn-like facing, grooves, and stepped diameters.
- Rotary roughing — cylinder roughing, adaptive high-speed clearing, and level clearing on rotary stock.
- Rotary clearing — slot, pocket, and feature clearing around recognized features.
- Eccentric journals — crank-pin machining: bay clearing around the orbiting pin, then an orbital turn finish with coupled Y-Z-A motion.
- Rotary fillet & chamfer — continuous-A finishing of the transition fillets and bevels where a journal meets a shoulder.
- Face finishing — flank-finishes the transverse faces: web cheeks and annular shoulders.
- Wrapped 2D — wrap a contour or pocket around the cylinder.
- Rotary parallel & pencil — finishing passes on the rotary surface; parallel takes stock-to-leave for a semi-finish pass.
The geodesic finish
Takshak's headline operation is a true simultaneous 4-axis finish — X, Y, Z and A coupled on every move. It drives scallop geodesic contours across the surface, and for every point along the path a collision solver leans the tool within your dialed range against the whole solid: penetration is a hard constraint, contact angle a preference. Points that genuinely can't be cleared are trimmed and reported — never silently gouged.
Simultaneous. Collision-certified. No silent gouges.
True B-rep, not mesh approximations
Takshak works on real solid geometry. You pick faces, edges and vertices directly on the B-rep and apply operations to them — fillets, chamfers, contours, and manual chains — with the precision of the actual model, not a triangulated stand-in.
STL and mesh parts are machinable too, through manual operations. A mesh has no faces to pick, so feature recognition and face selection need a solid — but trimming works, and rotary operations still take a rotary angle and an axial segment.
Verified before you cut
Complex 3D and rotary operations are checked for collisions before you ever see the toolpath. The simultaneous 4-axis finish goes further: an independent certifier re-checks the emitted motion — the full tool body against the whole solid, path interiors densified — and rides its verdict on plain notices, so a grazing pass or a collision is called out, not buried.
And you can play the whole cut back — tool, stock, and motion — watching material come off before a single line is posted.
The workflow
- Importa STEP solid — or a mesh, for manual ops
- Orientplace it on the machine
- Setupstock and work offset
- Fixturingclamps and no-go volumes
- Machiningrecognize, confirm, simulate
- Poststandard G-code for your machine
Gated, shortest path to first G-code — each phase opens only once the one before it is satisfied.
Formats, machines & requirements
Formats
In: STEP solids, with automatic feature recognition — and
STL / mesh.
Out: standard G-code for your machine's
post-processor.
Axes
3-axis milling plus a single rotary A-axis — indexed 3+1 and simultaneous 4-axis.
System
64-bit Windows 10 / 11, or 64-bit Linux with glibc 2.35 or newer
(Ubuntu 22.04+, Debian 12+, Fedora 36+) plus libgl1 and
libegl1. A GPU with modern OpenGL for the 3D viewport.
8 GB RAM, 16 GB for large models.
Display: 1280 × 768 minimum, 1920 × 1080 recommended. Takshak fits a shop laptop; at 1920 × 1080 every panel is visible at once without scrolling.
Ownership
A one-time perpetual license — activate once online, then work offline. No subscription.