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Using the Freeform tools

7 REPLIES 7
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Message 1 of 8
mark.young
1609 Views, 7 Replies

Using the Freeform tools

Thought I'd start a post for people to talk about the freeform tools.

 

I've been struggling a bit with the tools and also the help files, so perhaps we can help each other here.

 

A few things I've noticed:

 

- Crease Edge is in the R click menu but not in the toolbar. You can Uncrease Edge too. No help file on this but it creates a sharp 90 degree edge where you pick and in surrounding edges. No way to adjust the amount of crease.

 

- The tooltip for Match Edge says you can 'align a freeform body with a surface or solid'. I can't get it to work with surfaces.

 

- The help for Match Edge says "After completing the Match command, use Edit Form to remove portions of the freeform body that extend beyond what was matched to." I can't see anything in Edit Form for removing faces.

 

- I want to tweak and wrap a body around other compenents in my assembly. The solid violet colour doesn't let me see the things I'm trying to wrap the body around. Like surfaces, a Translucent option would be helpful. All I can do is set the visual style to 'shaded with hidden edges' The wireframe modes turn off the things I need to see 😞

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7 REPLIES 7
Message 2 of 8
JDMather
in reply to: mark.young

I would start with the Fusion 360 tutorials

http://fusion360.autodesk.com/resources

 

the Inventor tools are very similar.

 

 


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Message 3 of 8
johnsonshiue
in reply to: mark.young

Hi! Creasing a edge (edges) does not necessarily mean the adjacent faces become 90 degree. It depends. One thing is for sure is that the adjacent faces along a creased edge will stay sharp G0 (as opposed to smooth G2).

Match Edge should work with surface body edge along with solid body edge and 2D/3D sketch. It is not working, which is wrong. I will follow up with development and see what can be done about it.

The description of the workflow in this case is a bit confusing. I think what it is saying is that you can use Edit Form or Delete Edge/Point to manipulate shape. Whether or not Edit Form or Delete Edge/Point command can really help to achieve the goal depends on the Freeform geometry and the design intent. If you can post an example here or send it to me directly (johnson.shiue@autodesk.com), I can take a further look.

Regarding the violet color, it is on by default. You can change the display to different type (View -> Visual Style) within a Freeform command in Freeform environment.

Thanks!

 



Johnson Shiue (johnson.shiue@autodesk.com)
Software Test Engineer
Message 4 of 8
JDMather
in reply to: mark.young


@mark.young wrote:

T

- Crease Edge is in the R click menu but not in the toolbar. You can Uncrease Edge too. No help file on this but it creates a sharp 90 degree edge where you pick and in surrounding edges. No way to adjust the amount of crease. 

 


I was going to ask where you found this - but then I figured it out.

Must select the edge before RMB to get the option.

 

Crease Edge.png


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Autodesk Inventor 2019 Certified Professional
Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Certified Professional
Certified SolidWorks Professional


The CADWhisperer YouTube Channel


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Message 5 of 8
JDMather
in reply to: JDMather

Now if we could just get more tolerant Shell feature.


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Autodesk Inventor 2019 Certified Professional
Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Certified Professional
Certified SolidWorks Professional


The CADWhisperer YouTube Channel


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Message 6 of 8
mark.young
in reply to: JDMather

Hi all

 

I used Fusion360 quite a bit JDMather but the tools in Inventor are not as comprehensive yet, so some of the fusion tips would not be applicable.

 

Hope you can get the surface edges working johnsonshiue! That will make it a lot more useful. TBH I think the biggest thing missing is the way you could create a Freeform surface in Fusion - like the way you create a Patch in Inventor. You can sort of squidge the primitives around to get near what you want, but you have to then shell and remove 75% of what you made.

 

On the violet colour, I kind of said what you suggested! Even with the Visual Style changed to shaded with hidden edges, I've been getting weird effects like visible sketches not appearing, normally the ones I'm trying to match 😞 Anyway, what else.....

 

- The Draft Analysis works in real time on Edit Form! This is really cool. For injection mouldings using Freeform this is pretty essential.

 

- Once I've used Match Edge, any symmetry seems to be lost and it fails if I try to reapply it.

 

 

Message 7 of 8
KevinBurrows
in reply to: mark.young

Is there an option to adjust the smoothness?  I know you can Crease an edge, but is it possible to adjust the smoothness?  As an example of what I'm looking for, AutoCAD's freeform tools include the Increase Smoothness and a Decrease Smoothness commands.  These essentially increase or decrease the radii of the curves.

Message 8 of 8
PaulMunford
in reply to: KevinBurrows

Hi team,

 

I just wanted to let you know that I've put together a training video series on Inventor's new Freeform T-Splines tools for Infiniteskills.com

 

You can find out more about it here, including watching a few trailer videos:

http://cadso.co/LearnFreeform

 

Paul

 


Autodesk Industry Marketing Manager UK D&M
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