Autodesk Inventor

[#1]

Hello everyone,

I'm trying to model a spiral tube (or whatever it's called, please see attached pic for details), and I have absolutely no idea on how to do it.

The spiral cut must be real (not a cosmetic), beacuse later i will have to export the model to another progtam, and that program can't recognize cosmetics. Also, the tube is an irregular shape (not a simple cilinder or similar), like any tubing.

I'm using inventor 2013, standard or professional edition, whichever can do it easyer.

Thanks in advance,

B.

[#2]

Does this help you a bit?

[#3]

Hi,

Thanks for your interest, but unfortunately it's not quite what i need.

But if you can generate that first spiral along a curved line (3D sketch, not an axis), it would work. But how do i do that?

I need something like in the attachement, but I want to avoid using the bend feature... it's real hard to control , especially if i have to follow a cable created in cable design..

Well, thanks anyway.

B.

[#4]

Well. I don't know man... I'm skilled but not that skilled. 

[#5]

Hi B,

you didn't say what the other program was your sending your model to.

If it’s for rendering (3ds Max, Keyshot etc...)  You could get the effect you need by applying

an opacity map onto the surface of your model.

The mulit-bend approach would work but you may have to do so many tweaks you might lose

the will to carry on.

cheers

Mark

[#6]

Hello Mark!

The other program is Right Hemisphere's Deep Exploration 6.5. It is for rendering, but I'm not the one who will do the rendering. I will talk to the guy, but i would prefer to be able to do it in Inventor, if possible.

If not, well, bad luck for me then.

But if anyone has another idea, please share!

B.

PS: I already lost the will to carry on with the bend, that's why i posted my question in the first place

[#7]

I'm not sure how this would be possible in Inventor without using a lot of tedious bend operations.  Apart from that, I think your next best option would be to export the model as a straight coil from Inventor into a program like 3ds Max (if you have access to it), or Blender (which is free).

[#8]

Hi,

Am needing answer for your question too,

 hope some one can do it and tell us.

[#9]

Closest thing that i could come up with so far, is this:

It's far from perfect, but ok for representational purposes.

Maibe there is a way to fine-tune this somehow?

B.

[#10 · Accepted solution]

Here's another possible solution, using sweep with guide rail.

I created an octagonal surface with the boundary patch command, patterned it along a curve, and used the points as a guide to create a 3d sketch coiled around the curve.  I then used that 3d sketch as a guide rail for a swept cutout.

This method involves a little bit of manual labor for the 3d sketch (only took a couple of minutes for this example), but the end result allows you to easily make changes to the spline that defines the tube path.