topic guard rails in Inventor Forum

guard rails

Anonymous — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 13:07:15 GMT

Hi,

Does anyone make guard rails like the image attached?

If yes, what advice would you have on how to make these guard rails?

Would you make as individual parts and then insert into an assembly file?

Would you use the frame generator to create the rails and .ipt files for the uprights?

Any suggestions appreciated

Regards,

Peter

Re: guard rails

mdavis22569 — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 13:18:18 GMT

I would use Frame Generator ...

Then you would need to add the ball connection part to it...

Re: guard rails

wrw0007 — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 18:44:15 GMT

I dont make hand rails like that very often, but when I do, I always use frame generator.

Re: guard rails

blair — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 18:50:07 GMT

I would create the "Ball" connections as standard parts and then as posted create the hand-rails in Frame-Gen. Then use the "Trim" to shorten the members to match the "connection" distance for the ball-parts.

Re: guard rails

salariua — Thu, 13 Jul 2017 06:43:36 GMT

It all depends on your needs and skills.

Frame generator is the way to go because you can use notch, trim, operations but if you need to output the results to bending machine then you can do this in tube and pipe. I would author the ball as tp fitting so it snapps in place and create faster connections.

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/inventor-products/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Exporting-Tube-and-Pipe-runs-in-bending-machine-format.html

Re: guard rails

Anonymous — Thu, 13 Jul 2017 11:23:28 GMT

Thanks all for your suggestions

I will go with the FG

Re: guard rails

Anonymous — Wed, 02 Aug 2017 18:18:35 GMT

@salariua

Not, meaning to thread hi-jack but, how would you do the whole "author a ball as a tube/pipe fitting"?? Then saying that could you use this same idea for tube/pipe end caps, base/mount plates?

Re: guard rails

salariua — Wed, 02 Aug 2017 20:18:15 GMT

@Anonymous

yes, it's all doable. If you look at original post attachment, the balls are either tees or crosses.

I will do a short video in the morning to show you how this would work. I had the same idea on doing cable trays or unistrut framing (those are frame generator members now). Take a look at the connectors here, it would be really easy to snap them into place if they are TP fittings. Sadly I didn't have any time to move this forward.

keep in mind that you can even author empty parts, you don't need any geometry.

while you can even notch and connect lateral segments (branches in TP) I recommend frame generator because it's more natural and more intuitive for that.

Re: guard rails

salariua — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 08:11:01 GMT

Here’s a screencast. Unfortunately, I only had time to do it once, which doesn’t always mean right.

I hope you get the idea on how this would work. You might use AutoRoute in some places and decide to sketch in 3D and use Derive Route in other places.

I would use tubing with bends because you don’t need the fittings and rather have custom bends anyway.

Re: guard rails

Anonymous — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 13:26:12 GMT

Holy $***!

That's awesome. I mean I'm kinda mad at myself for not seeing tube and pipe as a way to do railing, mostly because I'd never even touched that environment at all.

Question though, if you can do that, can a person make a "custom-square-pipe" and do all same stuff??

I can't kuddo more than once, but you got mine.

Re: guard rails

salariua — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 13:35:25 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:

Question though, if you can do that, can a person make a "custom-square-pipe" and do all same stuff??

That is challenging, not impossible though.

Pipe orientation is not preserved in line with system origin. While a round pipe will look the same when you rotate it around its axis, rectangular, etc. will not.

There is now way of orienting pipe segments, but I will keep trying, have some ideas on how that might work...

Re: guard rails

Anonymous — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 13:54:43 GMT

I see, that's understandable.

I'm just trying to come up with an easier way to do hand railings and sometimes it's square or rectangle tubing. But it's not to terrible in FG not to mention the end treatments unless using a connector like the round ball.