Animating/Rigging a Cam + Follower

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

Anyone have any ideas on how to rig a cam lobe interacting with a follower similar to this:

[Steve_Curley]

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Autodesk-3ds-Max-3ds-Max-Design/constraining-elements-in-technical-ani...

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

I have a non-scripted rigging solution using constraints.

It starts with a Conform Spacewarp which conforms a face to the cam from above. The Standoff Distace of the Conform is equal to the radius of the follower.

A point helper is fixed to the face via an Attachment constraint, use Set Posiotion to centre it on the face.

The follower is fixed to the point with a Position constraint.

It is not 100% accurate, there is a slight intersection during the rise and fall to the peak of the cam, but good enough for illustrative purposes.

[Anonymous]

Thanks Samab.  This is a very clever use of the spacewarp.  I think i will try this out, like you said for visualisation purposes this will suffice.  

I will be studying Steve's link where there is some great links in that thead regarding rigging techniques.

Thank you both for your time