Thank you all very much for the extremely quick responses.
I have been able to fulfil my customer's request for a full-size template to enable him to manufacture this out of card. Don't ask me why he wants to...
Original Question:
So here we have a segment of a Terry's Chocolate Orange**, but made hollow in sheet metal. I need a flat pattern. I am at a loss to figure out how to model it so that I can produce a flat pattern. Any ideas?
Thanks,
John
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** a delicious item of confectionery, especially popular at Christmas-time, comprising segments arranged around a central spine, the whole approximating to a sphere of orange-infused chocolate.
Responses:
Pro/E will only unbend 'ruled' surfaces, which means that the surface can only bend in one direction. If the part/surface has curvature in two directions, it is called non-ruled geometry and Pro/E won't unbend it unless you tell it where it can stretch. The problem is that when you do that the flat pattern can be pretty different from what you might expect since it will actually add material to the part. Pro/E does not account for material thinning and stretching during the forming process - it assumes it is always a constant thickness.
John, maybe this will help, I asked this question a few years ago...
Is there a way to take a segment of a sphere or "lune" and flatten it so it could be printed out? I imagine this could be done in sheetmetal somehow?
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