Help retrieving XYZ data from a step file

[Darren_Eby]

Our customers sometimes send me a dot STEP file of a bent tubular part. I need to get the true XYZ data off of that part to program a CNC Bender. I have tried putting centerline's on a cylindrical object and measuring them. This does not work because of the shortest point measurement that Fusion gives you. I am open to drawing other information on the part to retrieve the data that I need. I am open for suggestions thank you below is a sample of the partiso view

[dsouzasujay]

Hi @Darren_Eby,

Can you attach the step file here to a Reply?

[Darren_Eby]

Attached is the fusion file format. I couldn't attached the .STEP of the part

[jeff_strater]

here is a way to do this interactively.  There is probably a way to do that using the API, but since there are so few data points here, I would just do it this way.  Basically, the idea is:

• create a "Point at center of circle, torus, sphere" at each section
• use point-to-point measure from the origin, turning on XYZ deltas
• the XYZ deltas are the coordinates of that point

I'm sure there are more elegant ways to do this, and I'm not sure it gives you the points you need, but it's a starting point, I think

[TheCADWhisperer]

Enable 3D sketching.

Lines center to center of cylindrical sections circular ends.

Points in space.  Set Coincidents with "intersecting" lines. (not physically intersecting, but would if continued in space)

[barry9UDQ6]

Are you looking for something like this?

[Darren_Eby]

Thanks for your quick reply. I understand how to to do this after watching your screencast 

[Darren_Eby]

Thanks for looking a my problem.

I found out how to find the intersection point of the centerlines 

[Darren_Eby]

Thanks for everybody's help.

I figured out one way is to combine some of the post and i came up with the below.

1ST construct lines from circle to circle

2nd extend the lines so that they intersect. now i have the intersection of the centerline 

3rd construct a tangent plane to draw sketch line on from each intersection point. i did my "X &Y" first.

4th construct a plane fort the "Z" plane and draw the sketch lines

5th make a drawing and dimension the sketch line. You will need to turn on the sketch lines in the drawing before you will be able to dimension

[HughesTooling]

When you draw the centre line between the circles if you click and drag you can create the arcs as well. Don't know if this is any help.

Mark

[JeromeBriot]

@Darren_Eby I wrote a Python code that automatically extracts the coordinates. I can easily write these coordinates to a file. Let me know if it is uesful for you.

[Darren_Eby]

Nice job.

Writing a code and extracting the data is very interesting. The code writing is way out of my abilities.

Thanks again for taking a look at my problem.

The intersection points of the centerline is most important. I use the intersection data to convert into machine data.

 

[JeromeBriot]

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@Darren_Eby wrote:

The intersection points of the centerline is most important. I use the intersection data to convert into machine data.

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I added the computation of the coordinates of the intersection points in my previous code.

The results are exported to a text file:

Coordinates in inches
Origin at point C1

c1 : +0.000 +0.000 +0.000
c2 : +0.000 -0.000 +3.000
c3 : -1.588 +1.215 +5.000
c4 : -9.770 +7.475 +5.000
c5 : -10.985 +7.887 +5.000
c6 : -14.308 +7.887 +5.000
c7 : -16.308 +5.887 +5.000
c8 : -16.308 -1.578 +5.000
c9 : -16.040 -2.578 +5.000
c10 : -13.972 -6.159 +5.000
c11 : -13.290 -7.398 +4.415
c12 : -12.045 -9.817 +1.701
c13 : -11.362 -11.056 +1.115
c14 : -6.276 -19.865 +1.115

i1 : +0.000 -0.000 +5.000
i2 : -10.308 +7.887 +5.000
i3 : -16.308 +7.887 +5.000
i4 : -16.308 -2.113 +5.000
i5 : -13.558 -6.877 +5.000
i6 : -11.776 -10.339 +1.115

[Darren_Eby]

Jerome  

Great job. I don't know how to write code and you do. The data is what is needed in the end.

Thanks for your input.

Darren

[JeromeBriot]

I finally wrote an add-in to automate the process of export/import XYZ data. See this thread:

New add-in to export and import tube geometries used with CNC bending machines (XYZ and LRA/YBC).