Autodesk Inventor

[#1]

Trying to dimension a shaft in isometric view with various diameters. I am unable to find or select the centerpoints at the ends of the shaft. This causes dimensions to be crooked. How can i get the centerpoints to display so that they may be selected?

[#2]

Hi KyleMJewell, 

If you select the arcs with the General Dimension tool you should get the result you're after (be sure not to select the green dots though). Note that you can use the Space bar to toggle through the avalable placement planes.

The green dots are object snaps. If you start the General Dimension tool and then right-click you should see a Snap Settings flyout menu, where you can control which snaps show up. But I don't you need to adjust these in this particular case.

I hope this helps.
Best of luck to you in all of your Inventor pursuits,
Curtis
http://inventortrenches.blogspot.com

[#3]

Hi KyleMJewell,

Also, once you've selected an arc you can right-click to find the Diameter and Use Sheet Plane options for the diameter dims.

I hope this helps.
Best of luck to you in all of your Inventor pursuits,
Curtis
http://inventortrenches.blogspot.com

[#4]

This method works if there is no modification to the shaft such as the threads or woodruff keyseat which prevent it from automatically recognizing centerpoints. I have tried several times and it still does not work.

[#5]

Hi KyleMJewell,

Can you provide us an example part file that demonstrates the issue you're seeing?

I hope this helps.
Best of luck to you in all of your Inventor pursuits,
Curtis
http://inventortrenches.blogspot.com

[#6]

Here is the part that I am having trouble with dimensioning. You may notice that the thread is coil cut because I needed it created that way.

[#7]

Hi KyleMJewell,

You're correct it is the coil cuts that are causing the issue, since they result in an edge that isn't a true arc. Unfortunately, I didn't really see an easy solution to placing those dimensions in that view. The best I could do was to turn on the hidden lines and scrub over each edge until I located the (very tiny) edge that was an arc, and then I used that to find the center point. Then I turned off the hidden lines.

I'm not sure that provides a very robust solution,  but it did work.

I hope this helps.
Best of luck to you in all of your Inventor pursuits,
Curtis
http://inventortrenches.blogspot.com

[#8]

Out of curiousity have you tried putting work points on your part prior to any modification cuts, then bringing those work points into the drawing for the dimensioning and either switching them to a different point style or turning them off after your dimension is set.

It should be a bit more 'robust' for future changes in length and you have points at the centers that can be used. I have always found that though a face/feature may change drastically if I put a work point at the right step my part will be extremely robust and almost impossible to break, the dimensions on drawings rarely drop out for that matter on the finer details.

[#9]

When i attempted the work point method i was not able to grab the point when dimensioning.

[#10]

Curtis,

Does this only work with Radius or Diameter dimensions?  In the picture below, I'd like to get the notes and linear dimensions onto the same plane... one or the other, I have no preference which.