13-Aquamarine

Solved

Best way to make a pattern projection on a cylinder surface?

Forum|Forum|9 years ago
April 5, 2017
4 replies
6769 views

I am trying to create a pattern on a cylindrical surface, starting at the simplest possible: a pattern of lines, inclined at 45 degrees. So I constructed a tangent plane to the cylinder surface, created a sketch of the first line, made a pattern of lines with 9 elements, and then got stuck -- there was no way for me to get to the OPTIONS part of the pattern, to set Follow Surface Shape and Follow Surface Direction etc. I did my homework in the sense that I watched a few YTube tutorials, but none of them were into simple things, they just dealt with more esoteric stuff that lost me after the first few minutes... If someone can point me to a good tutorial for projections on cylindrical surfaces (document or YTube), I would really appreciate the help.

My end result is to be able to draw different patterns of lines on pipes or elbows or any other rotational parts, so that when one goes to a "No Hidden" type of diagram, a pipe does not look just like two black parallel lines. Problem being that when you have multiple parallel pipes, spaced out at a distance about equal to the diameter of the pipes, everything becomes a set of equal-distanced parallel black lines over white space, making it difficult to tell which is the empty space and which is the part.

General

Best answer by StephenW

The way I would do this, assuming I am understanding your question correctly

Create sketch of one line.

Then use Edit project, (select the line, select the surface to project on to

The pattern using directional, select a plane normal to the direction you want to define the direction of the pattern and give a dimensional increment.

D

dschenken

1-Visitor

I don't see where you tried to project the lead curve. Pattern doesn't have an option to do the projection.

C

cgherghe-2

Author

13-Aquamarine

I do not know how to do this... I do not know what a lead curve is, and I do not know how to project it. This is exactly the problem that I am having. All I want to project are those lines... I need to know how does it get done from step one.

D

dschenken

1-Visitor

The 'lead' is the first item in a pattern.

S

StephenW

Answer

23-Emerald III

The way I would do this, assuming I am understanding your question correctly

Create sketch of one line.

Then use Edit project, (select the line, select the surface to project on to

The pattern using directional, select a plane normal to the direction you want to define the direction of the pattern and give a dimensional increment.

C

cgherghe-2

Author

13-Aquamarine

Got it!! Isn't it a beautiful thing?!? Such a wonderful feeling of satisfaction after being in the dark and then starting to know what you are doing! Thank you very much, I got bogged down at the beginning, when I hit "Project chains" vs. "Project a sketch" vs. "Project a cosmetic sketch".

Not having even the faintest what projecting chains entails, I chose "Project a sketch" and from there on it was a terrible mess, no idea how I got out of it, just kept hitting cancel through all the subsequent windows until I was able to get back to Properties.

Then I chose "Project chains" and it worked -- I got my first line on the cylinder. The second struggle was with Patterns, took a while to figure out I needed Geometry Patterns vs. Patterns, because I kept getting the pattern in the tangent plane, with only one curve on the cylinder surface.

But in the end I got it, thank you again!!

M

MikeBrattoli

12-Amethyst

Colin,

If you project your original curve onto the curved surface you can then pattern the projected curve (see images below). This should get you what you are asking for:

Mike

C

cgherghe-2

Author

13-Aquamarine

Mike, thank you for your detailed answer, I wanted to mark them all "Correct answer", but this system does not let me do so, no idea why!?!?
Your Model Tree there looks very professional, with all the axis presented, I couldn't notice how modest and simplistic mine looks by comparison... Plus the in-set window, it really looks smashing, personally @I am not capable of this level of detail right now, just learning the ropes... Thank you again for your answer, all the best!

kdirth

21-Topaz I

As long as you are on a cylinder, make one projected line and copy it. Then pattern it by direction.

You can also pattern by axis.

There is always more to learn.

C

cgherghe-2

Author

13-Aquamarine

Kevin, thank you for your answer, how do you pattern by axes? I could not see any in my part, maybe the environment needs to be set up the proper way, no idea... Thank you again, Colin.