Joining two flat edges that need to bend

[Anonymous]

I have a student who is designing a wooden tower and we have a problem. The sides of the tower are flat components however when they join they need to curve (think Eiffel Tower). They form a triangular pyramid like structure once assembled from these three flat pieces. They need to join along their edge but in order to do this the joint needs to bend the material. The curve cannot be calculated ahead of time and the material is being laser cut hence the need to be a flat material initially.

how do we resolve this please?

matt 

[Anonymous]

Maybe this can be accomplished with the Sheet Metal option when it gets released?

[Anonymous]

I have just uploaded an image of the tower if that helps

m

[Beyondforce]

Hi @Anonymous,

@Anonymous is right. It's not possible to bend or flatten a curved body right not. But if you are still interested, I can show you how to build this tower with the curve in Fusion.

Cheers / Ben
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[Anonymous]

Yes, that sounds great. I will get the file off of her today or tomorrow and post it here.

Thanks

M

[TrippyLighting]

You have described the geometry, but what its the problem you are trying to solve ?

If these three pieces identical and symmetric about the vertical axis you can simply design these pieces flat, cut them out and assemble them. While you cannot pr-determine the curvature the pieces will assemble fine as the length of each edge is equal.

If you are trying to achieve a specific curvature and height of the piece then you need to design them in their curved form and find a way to flatten them. That in fact should be possible with the Sheet metal tools coming up.

[Anonymous]

The pieces have been successfully designed and made using a 2d CAD program and cut out on a laser, then assembled. The students were learning how to convert this into a 3D model so that we could teach them how to create a finished rendering and show stresses through the structure to simulate realistic loading. The final model is in the picture of the original post. Most of the students chose a traditional A frame type structure whereas this young lady chose to be more adventurous.

Sent from my iPhone

[TrippyLighting]

Aha. The curved design definitely is cool!

[Anonymous]

Yeah. It's good and bad when they stretch our knowledge like this. They were working on a topic linked to a school Science Olympiad project.

Thanks for the help.

Sent from my iPhone

[TrippyLighting · Accepted solution]

Here is  a screencast how I'd approach this. Model is attached.

I'll see if I can find the time this weekend to do this with the sheet metal preview functionality. This would present a nice opportunity to play with it 😉

[TrippyLighting · Accepted solution]

Here is a version I created with the sheetmetal functionality (not yet released):

Thanks again to @PhilProcarioJr for his awesome sheetmetal thread!

[Noah_Katz]

TL,

I imported your file and get the gist; only watched a tutorial or two on Patch and that was awhile ago.

The 3rd step from the end is RemoveBody; what body is it?

I see no change when toggle that step on/off in the timeline).

And how did you delete it? I don't see it under Modify; just select and delete key?

Thanks

[TrippyLighting]

The reason you don't see a change is because that surface/patch body is equal with the surface of the solid body created by the thicken command. When you remove it you remove it from that point onward in the timeline. Deleting it is removing all traces of it from the entire timeline, which would not work as it is needed earlier in the timeline for the thicken command to work.

[Noah_Katz]

Oh, I thought bodies were always 3D, but that clears that up; thanks.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for all of your help with this issue

M