How to find sketch errors?

[Anonymous]

Hi guys.  Routinely, during my design process,  I remove/edit geometry that is referenced by downstream sketch constraints.  Thus, these downstream constraints fail.  Solidworks calls these "dangling" constraints and it has a tool to view all the sketch constraints within a sketch.  Over-constrained items show up red, dangling show up yellow.

Is there a tool in Fusion to view my sketch constraints?  It frustrating to be told there is an error, but no mechanism to determine what the error is.  Is there a tool like this that I'm missing?  Attached is a pic of a sketch that has an error - no idea what it is.

Thanks,

Walt

[PhilProcarioJr]

@Anonymous

As far as I know there is no tool like the one in Solidworks, but if you right-click on the erroneous sketch in the time line and select view warnings it will at least tell you if the problem is in the sketch or because you lost the plane or face the sketch was made on. If the error is in the sketch the problems usually show up in yellow once you edit those sketches.

[jeevesme]

  I just watched this last night.  Is this what you are seeing?  Start at 32:00.

http://au.autodesk.com/au-online/classes-on-demand/class-catalog/classes/year-2016/fusion-360/pd2070...

[Anonymous]

The only thing useful I saw was the break link option.  At least that preserves the sketch.

The Fusion team needs to work on this - its critical to be able to diagnose errors.

[paul.clauss]

Hi @Anonymous

Thanks for posting! It looks like you are having some troubles pinpointing sketch errors in Fusion 360.

I do know that improving all of our error messaging for clarity is on the long-term roadmap for Fusion, and there are some Ideastation posts asking for the greater visual options involving sketch constraints that I have linked here and here.

I agree that a sketch check function like the one in some other CAD programs would be a valuable addition to Fusion! Please either vote on an Ideastation post or create your own explaining what you would like to see and we will consider adding it in!

[Anonymous]

Paul, thanks for your reply.  I read your posts and voted for your ideas.

I'm made the break and started using F360 for my paying jobs.  So more than ever, I need to ability to see, edit and delete sketch constraints.  It's frustrating when I have to make a simple sketch edit (that effects down stream features, drawings, toolpaths & etc) yet am not able to w/o deleting lines and arc.  In most cases, I can use the "Break Link" tool to preserve my sketch geometry and simply re-do the constraints, but often the Break Link doesn't remove everything.

The sketch constraints are there, I don't understand why you can't make a tool that lists them.  One mouse click in Solidworks gives me this dialog box.  This is simple and effective.

 

[TrippyLighting]

While I agree that there is room for improvement, for the most part these reason for these reference errors can be avoided by an improved workflow.

The Fusion 360 team is cognizant of the needed improvements, but I believe currently these are  not high on their priority list.

[Anonymous]

After using SolidWorks for many years, I expect to be able to diagnose and fix sketch errors quickly.

I created a simple sketch and extruded it. After adding more details to the sketch, the extrusion fails and there is to indication as to where it is failing. The error message is too generic to help me make corrections. I have made multiple edits to the sketch and, not only does the initial extrusion continue to fail, I can't even delete the initial extrusion and use the sketch for a new one. The sketch profile is just un-selectable. 

The lack of a clear feedback in Fusion 360 makes this feel like beta software. Please give this UI change a high priority and stop blaming the problem on poor process or user error. I want to be able to correct the error, but can't because the software does not provide enough information.

[Craig.Feied · Accepted solution]

There are hundreds of people complaining about these unfindable errors, and no help to be found anywhere. I've spent hours searching for help with a simple construct that has a red bar on a body, but no yellow on the timeline -- there's not a hint anywhere. 

Presumably I caused it by deleting something, but for crying out loud, you have to *know* you're going to create these unfindable and unfixable errors after I delete something, so how about warning me before I delete it?  And how about making it possible to see what problem you have identified?

When I get one of these red bars on a body I generally end up rebuilding from scratch, and I'm angry the entire time.

Fusion 360 is the ONLY modeling program in which this kind of thing happens.  I moved to F360 because you guys did such a great job with Eagle, but I have to say that my feelings about Autodesk take a nosedive when I work with Fusion. A few hours ago I loved you; right this minute I hate you.  F360 is so close to awesome that it hurts, but after several weeks of struggling it's still virtually impossible to get any actual work done, which means there is no chance in the world that I could recommend Fusion the way it works right now. (Sigh) and now, back to SW. 

[TrippyLighting]

There are many areas in Fusion 360 where there is serious work to be done to make is as mature of a tool as Solid Works is. I don't work with Solid Works at the moment but have worked with it for about 15 years designing machinery ( I worked for 2 of the worlds  largest factory automation integrators)  I would not consider Fusion 360 a good tool for.

However, many people coming from Solid Works and other, similar packages also overuse sketches and cram as much information into a sketch as possible. Then they also heavily trim sketch geometry, because in SW you have to in order to be able to create 3D geometry from it.  Granted, also it makes the sketch more "readable".

In Fusion 360 you don't have to trim sketches to reflect the outline of the profile you wish to extrude, revolve sweep, etc. You can extrude several sketch profiles from a single sketch at once and if they are adjacent they will auto join.

If you keep your sketches simple and learn building geometry using 3D features in general Fusion 360 will be much happier.

YMMV

[docara]

Hi

I hear your pain!!!!

What I do when I encounter a sketch problem, which usually means I do not have a fully enclosed profile, is two things

1) Zoom IN, zoom in and zoom in some more and look for double points next to each other which might indicate a break

2) Have a play with both the Extrude and Trim commands to see if you can join lines.

Only today I noticed a little quirk which I will now look for. If you say draw a line and you Tangent constraint to a curve, I've noticed it will snap to the projected perceived intersection point. The constraint icon still appears making you think there is a join or lines intersect but the do not always connect.

Matt

[jeff_strater]

I will agree with the overall topic here that Fusion sketch could use some more debugging tools, in sketch and other areas.  These are certainly on our list, but things do not move as quickly as everyone would like, unfortunately.  I'm sure that when Fusion has been around for as long as Solidworks has, it will have a nice set of these tools.  In the meantime, we appreciate your patience, and your sharing of tips to help others.

Along those lines, check out the handout from the AU class that myself and @Phil.E put on at last year's session.  It contains some tips to help with debugging profiles, and other useful sketch techniques:  Fusion 360 sketch tips.

Jeff

[Phil.E]

@jeff_strater (you forgot to mention all the links to Screencast videos in the paper - super helpful short takes....) 

[HughesTooling]

@Phil.E Just looked through the document on finding sketch breaks where you've recreated my example problem. One small difference though, the white points that can show open ends are OK but there's a problem in what looks like a good corner. So although the white points are a good clue to problems it's not always that easy. Don't know if it's mentioned anywhere but chaining is another good diagnostic for imported curves, just double click a chain and it'll stop at the problem. Have noticed that chaining doesn't work across projected to normal curves, is that a bug?

Mark

[Phil.E]

Not sure. Will have to defer to @jeff_strater on this one.

[jeff_strater]

yes, I have seen bugs related to chaining across projected curves sometimes.  We are still investigating these.

[Anonymous]

2018, and still Fusion 360 is the worst parametric modelling software in this universe (all 13 dimensions)

Fusion team must be joking.

They just asked above that we should fill an actual complaint about the simple thing of just showing what is wrong so that we can delete is in a distant roadmap!!

I am considering asking Autodesk to pay me to use this software, like it must have done with many guys so that it gains popularity(?)

Seriously, i can work on Most Parametric CAD on the Market (including old Topsolid and new Topsolid (other world), NX, Proe/Creo, Catia, Solidworks and many others, plus many 3D/2D software, game engine and whatever you can think of, but the amount of terribleness and absurdity i have seen in Fusion 360 is just insane.

Nothing really works.

Fillets are broken, slow, no features, selection sets suck big time (they do not exist in reality), model brakes in a snap because of the ridiculous forced contour sketching (as opposed to real sketch in features), cannot be repaired and many stuff have to be done from scratch. Parametres never work without bug or do not work at all. T-splines is full buggy in Symmetry. Shell does not Shells, appearances cannot be added to features, multiple features cannot be added to patterns, surfaces cannot be selected in fillets.

What on earth, really. Fusion seems like a marketing social experiment.

Just do some cutbacks and sell it to Nickelodeon.

ps. the most irritating part is that the CAM module seems pretty decent, if not good (have not tested it much but roughing HSM like toolpaths look ok and have a pleasant amount of options, will test one day more). But how on earth did we end up in CAM? we cannot even model simple machine shop parts with ease of mind that the parametric model will not brake for not real reason. wonder if Shapr for iPad is more robust, for real.

[HughesTooling]

@Anonymous Why not start a new thread with some questions rather than bury it here in an old thread. If you are talking about multiple solid features in a pattern then that works.

Here you can a pattern with 4 feature selected from the timeline.

Have you tried Rule Fillet, it allows face selection.

Personally don't like using appearances, I find them distracting but being able to drop them onto features or selection sets sounds like a good idea. Adding them one face at a time is pretty useless.

I've used a couple other solid modelers, Alibre and ZW3d. I find designing mould tools far easier in Fusion, took a while to figure out a good workflow but I can design tools in Fusion quicker than the other now. Don't have any more problems with sketches or features breaking than any other software.

Really start a new thread or several and post your problem files maybe Fusion's not up to what you need but it might be just you need a different workflow.

Mark

[TrippyLighting]

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@HughesTooling wrote:

it might be just you need a different workflow.

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A different attitude would also likely be beneficial!

[Anonymous]

thank you dad.