Move, Align, Joints
Hi,
The move command will move a body or component in relation to an origin above it. In other words, moving a body that's in a component will redifine it's position relative to the origin of that component. Moving a component will redefine its origin in relation to the global origin (or the origin of the component group, if that component is in a component group).
Because it's redefining the object's position relative to these other things, it is saved in the timeline so that you can go back and edit that move, or delete it. This is important for Fusion's top-down design methodology, where you're designing parts off of other parts in your full assembly.
When you copy a part or a component, it will appear in the same location as the original, and you'll see that it immediately allows you to move it away from the original with translate and rotate bars, like the move command. I would move it where you need it then, and then you can use the move command to move it at any other point in time.
Just note that when using the move command, selecting a body will only move that body within a component. Selecting the full component will move all of the contents of the component.
Alignment works similarly - it's moving a body to align with another using a certain geometry from each. Align Components will do the same, but everything in the component will move when you execute the align. Once again, in this case, the whole component, including its origin and any sketches or construction geometries will move with it.
With the align tool, however, your parts are not constrained in space based on that align. It simply positions them, as the move command does. You can then immediately move them around more and unalign them.
To constrain them, we use Joints, which can only be applied between components, using certain geometries of the bodies in those components. Joints limit the degrees of freedom that the object can move in space, meaning they're locked to the limits of that joint.
Hope that helps! Let me know if this needs more clarifying!
Thanks,
Tanner
Tanner Reid
Product Design Engineer
When you create a joint, you are defining the available degrees of freedom between two component. For example, if you use a rigid constraint between two components and then you have defined that there should be 0 degrees of freedom between the components. The components will move together, maintaining their relative position to one another. Try using the Move command on one component that has a rigid Joint shared with another component.
This could be useful if you were designing a mechanism; for example, maybe you would like a bolt to move with the components that it is bolting together. Joints are useful if component's relationships are dependent on the geometry of the component. Consider what happens if you were to move the clearance hole for the bolt. Would you like the component's position to update accordingly? Joints are obviously useful for more complicated interactions; however, I think the names of the joints speak for themselves ball , slider, revolute, pin-slot, planar, cylindrical, and rigid.
I should add here, that if you import a component group (assembly) and you would like all of the components to "stick together," use the rigid group command. I feel like this is often overlooked. This command "locks" together the selected components in theRigid Group.
The Move command has it's uses as well. Perhaps, you're not in a phase where you are ready to start defining joints between components and you just want to change the position of something or move something out of the way for a sec (not toggle it's visibility). These positions are recorded as snapshots in the timeline, so you can always go back to the original starting position by reverting or save the position by save snapshot. One thing I don't think is obvious is that if you drag a component around in the workspace, you are invoking a component move command. You'll note that the snapshot commands will show up on the right side of the ribbon when you move components... sneaky sneaky.. 🙂
The below suggestion by Phil is an awesome use of the Component Move command to generate exploded views in the workspace (if you don't want to use the exploded view in the animation environment).
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/general-fusion-360-questions/multiple-snapshots/td-p/5482302
Another example of the move component command is that you're making something that follows an irregular pattern. You copy a component, move the copy, record a snapshot, and then boolean the components together with the combine command... rinse and repeat. If later you want to update the position of one of the instances, you can edit the snapshot. There are some other positional modeling functionality available that the Move command can help with. Perhaps you would like to know design a component based upon the position of another component. Move components can be useful for this since it can generate snapshots. Check out Keqing's video using the move command, joints, and snapshots in a positional modeling technique to generate slot geometry for this box cutter (~ 10 minute mark).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOh1m4Yp4bk
I find that the move and the align command are great if you are not planning to create components in a design. The move and align command work great for moving bodies which Joints cannot do.
The Move command has a lot of purposes. I'm not sure that I covered everything, but there's a lot to cover. I hope this helps with the intent of the Move command.
Let me know if anything is unclear or you have any other questions.
Thanks,
Nathan Chandler
Principal Specialist
