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Multi-Color Wood Turning Project

djsykora

Member
Multi-Color Wood Turning Project

In Alibre Design I want to design a woodworking project that is turned on the lathe. I would like the final assembly to have the shape that I desire, which of coarse is just a revolve, but I want several different colors of wood to show.

For example I create a part that is a pie section, and then duplicate it in 4 different colors to represent 4 different types of wood. In an assembly I align all the pie sections to make a complete cylinder, with a pattern of slices with the colors that I want. But now, I want to turn this assembly of different colored slices into a shape that I desire, such as a bowl.

My first attempt was to create a single revolved part with the desired shape. Then I tried to do an intersect Boolean operation between the part with the desired shape and the assembly with the desired color pattern of pie slices. I found out this does not work because the result is a part, not an assembly.

Is there a way to create an assembly with the results that I want? If the assembly mode had a Boolean operation with an assembly result, then I think I would get what I want. But I do not see this as an option in assembly mode. Do you have any suggestions on how I can accomplish my objective?

It would be nice to do a revolve cut on an assembly, similar to how one cuts wood from an assembly of small pieces on a lathe. Any advice on this topic would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Douglas Sykora
 

MilesH

Alibre Super User


Hi Douglas,

"Assembly level tools" are on the enhancement requests list, as is "Color assignment by Feature" - the latter would enable you to achieve what you want within a Part file.

For now, maybe you could add the profile that you need into the pie section before duplicating, coloring and assembly?

This was very quick: http://www.alibre.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=15122#15122
 
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