Parametric Design with Aluminum Extrusion Profiles? (80/20)

[Anonymous]

Hey there! Relatively new to the forums but I searched around for a little bit and couldn't find any great answers - I'm designing a relatively simple 80/20 aluminum based track system. I want everything to be parametric as the design will have to change depending on the chart mounted on the frame (the hanging rectangle in the photo). Currently, I'm sketching the width of the 80/20 bar (1.5" for 1515-LS extrusion) as I would with an older version of AutoCAD but I can't seem to figure out how replace the Bodies with 80/20 profiles - I want to avoid using .STEP files from 80/20 as those won't scale with User Parameters (unless I'm overlooking some awesome feature). Ideally, I would love to use the .DXF sketches! Anyone have any tips that aren't as difficult as I'm making this? Any suggestions or tutorials on skeletal modelling within Fusion 360? 

Cheers! 

[etfrench]

I would use a joint to place an extrusion in the same location as a rectangular block (since you already have the rectangular box in the correct position). Use the same dimension to control the length of the extrusion and the rectangular block.  Use the Mirror function and the Rectangular Pattern as much as possible.

[chrisplyler]

Since you seem able to project/capture the profile shape, copy that and paste it into new sketches at the ends of your square tubes, such that you can then extrude it down the length of the tube with the Intersect method selected.

Or get rid of the square tubes and extrude the profile in their place instead.

Or do what I did... Create a new component and therein insert a STEP file of a stick of McMaster-Carr 47065T102, copy that component and 'paste new' four times under the top-level project so that you end up with five components, push/pull them each to the proper length, and then joint them together appropriately.

[chrisplyler]

Or the most efficient way - which I resort to quite a lot - is just to leave the representation as is with the square tubes and put a little note on the drawing that says something like, "FRAME SHALL BE CONSTRUCTED OF 1.5" 6061 ALUMINUM T-SLOT AS MANUFACTURED BY BLAH BLAH BLAH MODEL# BLAH BLAH BLAH AND ASSEMBLED WITH T-SLOT FASTENERS AS MANUFACTURED BY....," you get the idea.

[ray_simmons]

I also use 80/20 profiles quite regularly so I took a different approach of creating my own library of profiles.  I first downloaded the complete Solid Works profile set directly from the 80/20 site onto my hard drive.  I then uploaded the profiles I wanted from this set to the cloud into their own folder (80/20 profiles), opened each profile in turn and created a projected sketch and then deleted the bodies leaving just the sketch that I then saved.  I then used the saved sketch profile into my drawing by just 'importing into current drawing' and extruded to the length needed.

Ray