How can I loft between two splines "intelligently" ?

How can I loft between two splines "intelligently" ?

OceanHydroAU
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Message 1 of 7

How can I loft between two splines "intelligently" ?

OceanHydroAU
Collaborator
Collaborator

I've got 2 38-point splines, both constructed the same way (from the tail, over the top through the nose and back to the tail), each with the same number of points above and below the chord line.

 

Fusion360 is selecting a "weird" place to commence the loft.

 

Any idea how to correct that?

 

Example here: https://a360.co/3bC4l5d

 

Screen Shot 2020-05-16 at 6.05.46 pm.png

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1,679 Views
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Message 2 of 7

g-andresen
Consultant
Consultant
Accepted solution

Hi,

what you need > rails!

foil rails.png

Screencast

 

günther

Message 3 of 7

OceanHydroAU
Collaborator
Collaborator

Thanks Guenther!  It looks like I was on the right path (pardon the pun) but it seems that construction lines can't be rails, only normal lines can - which is why I got stuck!

 

You exellent example lead me to the answer 🙂

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Message 4 of 7

Intuos5
Advisor
Advisor

@OceanHydroAU  The model shows surface imperfections (highlighted in red), to improve the surface quality, you should try to minimise the amount of control points in the splines.

foilmesh_Surface_imperfections.png

You probably only require two or three points in a 'fit point spline' and four in a 'control point spline' for further reference see: Control Point Splines: Create complex Sketch curves with precision and ease.

Message 5 of 7

TrippyLighting
Consultant
Consultant

Adding a rail is certainly going to result in predictable behaviour, but it isn't strictly needed in this case 😉
The loft algorithm has to map the 38 points from one spline to the 38 points in the other spline. Visually this can be seen in the viewport during the lofting process. You just need to drag the mapping handle to the correct point.

 

 

 

 


EESignature

Message 6 of 7

OceanHydroAU
Collaborator
Collaborator

@Intuos5 - I would LOVE to minimize the points, but Fusion 360 has some "invisible magic" going on when it computes the weights for fit-point-splines, and they've not revealed to me (yet) what that is.

 

My source is actually just 14 points (17 including the nose and top/bottom tails), but it's a cubic B-spline, and that is what my "tens of thousands-of-hours of CPU time" has used to find ideal foil shapes.

 

Unfortunately, the Fusion splines don't line up with my splines, so I've got to insert a bunch more annoying points in the middle to reduce the amount of error that's crept in between their splines and mine, so that my customers get the correct shape to match the performance data that goes with it...

 

Your post did give me an excellent idea to try out though (thanks!!!) - perhaps it's possible to write a converter that goes from B-splines to Fusion360 control-point-splines, so I can return to my original 17 points safely that way ?[control-point splines are usually B-splines of some order or other - lets hope Fusion360 implemented them that way with no secret magic!]

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Message 7 of 7

OceanHydroAU
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Collaborator

Oh wow - I didn't know that was possible. Thanks!

 

Do you happen to know what that feature is called or how it is exposed through the API?  Rails can work OK in the API, but I would much prefer to not have to add more sketch elements that are not strictly needed.

 

I found this, but I think I'm off track (pardon the pun again...)

https://help.autodesk.com/view/fusion360/ENU/?guid=GUID-B08B08BE-391A-4F12-AE1A-B8C556CD6FD6

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