Reference Geometry using Measurement Tool

[Elrick]

Greetings,

I want to share this tip to those who doesnt know about it. Its been one of the most helpfull "tools" I came across by accident. Dont think this is part of the tutrials? In a nutshell, when you enter the 2d drawing workspace you can use the measurement tool to get refernce geometry from solid parts' edges regardless of which plane you are drawing on. This is a bit hard to explain since Im not familiar with all the english terms. Or perhaps didnt pay enough attention in colege For this reason I dont know what a suitable heading would be. But that reference line is a flat perpendecular projection of the actual edge on the drawing plane. I will add screenshots to make things clearer. This is very helpfull when you want to edit parts in assemblies. Now the problem with this is that the reference geometry dissapears when you click on anything else than the measurement tool if the edge of the solid aint 100% liniar. If the edge is liniar, no matter how its caught up in space in relation to the plane youre drawing on, it is projected and gives you the start and end node of the edge. The last pic is an old one but should make things clear on how usefull it is when designing stuff.

I want to make a request to someone influential at GeoMagicDesign to look into this. It might be a weird drawing style but you will see how awesome it is when you use it. If the reference lines could be stopped from dissapearing it would save a lot of time and effort!?

Any suggestions or comments welcome.





Regards

 

[Elrick]

Forgot to mention one thing. You have to place atleast one node or piece of geometry in the drawing before this is "activated".

 

[TylerDurden]

I'm trying, but don't see how this is different from "Project to Sketch", which places sketch figures normal to the sketch plane, regardless of the view orientation.

 

[Elrick]

Project to sketch could only be used with planar faces. The measurement tool detects any edge and projects a perpendicular 2d reference image on the drawing plane when selected. You have to activate 2D Sketch and be ale to to use the measurement tool. It works similar to "project to sketch". But you cant work with projected reference geometry when it consists of splines. It dissapears before you can use it. When the edge is liniar it projects a usable reference line. See attached screenshot. My gues is that projected reference splines confuses the measurement tool. It is only working partially since it does project the edge.

 

[DavidJ]

Project to sketch could only be used with planar faces.

Project to sketch has worked with edges as well as faces all the time that I've used Alibre/GMD. It will also work with non-planar faces (e.g. cylindrical ones) though the result may not be quite what everyone would expect.

 

[Elrick]

Project to sketch has worked with edges

What do you mean? When the ptroject to sketch is selected it looks for a planar face. When you hover the pointer over an edge it indicates "Invalid selection". Am I missing something?

It will also work with non-planar faces

Could you please elaborate and add a demonstration?

 

[ajayre]

What do you mean? When the ptroject to sketch is selected it looks for a planar face. When you hover the pointer over an edge it indicates "Invalid selection". Am I missing something?

I've noticed that some edges are only selectable with Project-to-sketch when using the view mode "shaded and all edges" or "wireframe".

Andy

 

[DavidJ]

Hopefully these images make things clear.

 

[Elrick]

Clearly I was missing something. The thing which confused me is that project to sketch is a tool to use before and after you have activated 2d sketch mode. Never even touched it when 2d drawing is active. This unlocks many doors. For a second there I thought I discovered something that could improve GMD when it already was there lol :roll: Im considering going through the manual ond tutorials again. This is one thing I should never have missed. Thank you very much gents!!!

 

[Elrick]

What makes it even more embarrasing is that project to sketch is my favorate tool. I seriously cant believe this. Thanks again!

 

[TylerDurden]

Super handy in assemblies (via edit-here). Also handy, is being able to rotate the part/assembly while in sketch mode, to select the feature desired for projection.

@andy:
Some part features may be obstructed by other geometry (or other parts in assemblies), so showing edges (or hiding parts in assys) can be useful. But, lots of lines can get confusing, so rotating the view (as noted above) will still project the selected geometry to the sketch-plane. After projection, the "orient to sketch plane" button places the sketch back parallel to the screen.

 

[Elrick]

haha thanks Tyler agreed! Ive got orient to sketch plane right next to the project to sketch in my customised toolbar. The previous next view buttons next to them. Edit here another thing I use regular everyday. Im very excited to see the new grounds to be reached with this!!!

 

[ajayre]

Some part features may be obstructed by other geometry (or other parts in assemblies), so showing edges (or hiding parts in assys) can be useful. But, lots of lines can get confusing, so rotating the view (as noted above) will still project the selected geometry to the sketch-plane. After projection, the "orient to sketch plane" button places the sketch back parallel to the screen.

That doesn't always work for me. Sometimes some edges just can't be selected even with rotation. Until show all edges is turned on. Might be just a glitch...

Andy