Multiple holes on a complex surface

[Anonymous]

Any ideas on the best way to create holes along a complex surface that are evenly spaced and cut perpendicular to the surface? I've attached an example image of what the final would look like but it is for a different application. Any help would be great. Thanks!

[neljoshua]

As a first attempt, I would try setting up work planes that are perpendicular to the surface, sketch some circles, and use extrude to cut through the body.

If the body has some curved surfaces, you could do a linear pattern of holes, create an axis, and then pattern the holes around the body.  See the example below.

If the body is a bit more complex, a combination of the two methods may work.

http://a360.co/20TEGZI

[sebmorales]

Take a look at this post, a lot of manual labour but it could solve your problem:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/design-validate-document/sketch-on-curved-surface-or-boolean-a-patter...

[donsmac]

I've made a screencast showing how to pattern holes over the surface. In this case, spheres are patterned over the surface using 'Create/Pattern on a Path'.

Here I cut the body, that contained the spheres, from the model. Then swithed to the timeline in order to gain access to the 'Fillet Rule' tool.

A note: The paths are made by projecting straight lines from a sketch to the surface. Note that the projected lines on the surface contain points wherever it crosses over the edges of faces. These points can be used to snap the endpoints of the 'Pattern on a Path' to. So in the video, before I project these paths to the surface, I make a sketch offset from the bottom edge of the piece. After projecting the offset line to the surface, the 'Split Face' is used to create an another edge. That new edge will give the required endpoints for the 'Pattern on Path'. The resulting holes will follow the edge of the part.

An alternative to cutting spheres from the surface, would be to use 'Split Face' then 'Push/Pull' all the circles on the surface through the body resulting in tapered cylindrical holes. That however is very time consuming.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the responses. So I tried projecting a path on the surface and then patterning along the path but the issue I am having as the cut is patterned along the path it isn't staying perpedicular to the surface. I've attached a screen shot and hopefully you can see what I am talking about. I am needing the holes to stay perpedicular to the surface because the small pegs will be insereted into the holes and I don't want them to be going in at wierd angles. I could create a contruction plane at each point where there will be a hole but that will take forever and if there is a easier way that would be ideal. I hope I am making sense. Any more help or advice you can offer would be great. 

[HughesTooling]

Have you set Orientation to Path Direction, I guess you have or the holes would be more distorted.

[donsmac · Accepted solution]

I've made a screencast showing a method which will give you the results you want, ie. cylindrical holes who's axis are perpendicular to the surface.

The basic idea is to project points to the surface, then using these points to create axis that are perpendicular to the surface.

Then make a cylinder and use  the 'rectangular pattern' to make a bunch of copies (faster than using copy/paste).  Use the 'Align' tool to position all the cylinders over the body.

Not shown in the screencast ( which is highly edited) I made a body that could be used to combine all cylinders together as one object to be used to Cut holes in the model in one shot.

I used a decal of an isometric grid on the model and used that for a reference to locate the holes, but you could of course use other methods to do that or a different image as a decal.

Just a note: when you are Aligning the cylinders press ok once and a while, because if you are almost done and press cancel or undo you will lose all the aligning you did and have to start from the beginning.

One last thing: do half the model, once done, split the model in half and mirror the half with the holes and join the two halves together.

Athough the screencast is incomplete, it shows the concept.

[donsmac]

In any case patterning cylinders on a path that is on a curved surface would not neccessarily result in cylinders that are perpendicular to the surface since the command has no idea of the angle that the surface passes through the curve. The curve exists but any number of surfaces could pass through that curve.

[Anonymous]

This seems to work. Thanks for your help! 

[cekuhnen]

@donsmac

I understand it correctly that you just placed the dots by hand using a UV wrapped image with reference lines?

[masterskywalkerog]

wow thats pretty cool . learned soemthing new 

[Anonymous]

Hi @neljoshua ,

thank you for sharing your knowledge. This is exactly what I need but I can't get the last step to work. How do I select the Center Point that I need for the Circular Pattern?

Best,

Andreas

[TheCADWhisperer]

@Anonymous 

File>Export and then Attach your *.f3d file here.

[LucianNovosel]

This is great, but how do you project the points evenly onto the curved surface?

[g-andresen]

Hi,

Meanwhile there is the embossing tool (solid > create > emboss/deboss) which also works for multiple curved bodies.

Günther