Problems with Alignments & Joints

[george]

I've tried all sorts of different ways to make this assembly and it's just not working like I expect it to, There is a rail that has a groove which holds a M3 nut. There is a plate that attaches to this rail by placing a M3 bolt through a hole and threaded into the nut.

I can't seem to get the nut aligned into the groove and then the assembly between the plate, bolt and nut. Here's a link to my project. What I'm talking about is the located in the lower right corner of the table.

Any help with this would be greatly appreciated!

[TrippyLighting]

I downloaded your project, however, the re-upload to my account failed. I noticed that the downloaded file was over 100MB. Not sure what you've got in there but maybe you can strip the unnecesary stuff out of it and upload something lightweight so we can show you on your own model how to prodeed.

[george]

Wow, sorry about that. I guess because I inserted 48 wood inserts the project grew, no wonder it takes forever to save!

Here is a link to a new project that just has the 4 components.

• I inserted the nut in the groove but it is not centered in the groove as it should be.
• I created a joint between the nut and bolt but the min/max is not set not is the bolt motion.
• I think I have the plae properly aligned with the bolt and nut but it needs to be against the face of the beam. I tried making a planar joint but it failed.

Thanks for your time, here's a link to the reduced project, Joint test

[TrippyLighting]

I posted a bug report because even the smaller file would not upload properly.It appears to be a known issue an they are working on it.

I've generated a similar file and made a little screencast to explain one method of solving the problem.

[george]

Thank you for posting that screencast, it was helpful for me. In that channel/groove of the beam is going to be a nut and then the bolt would go through the plate hole and thread into the nut. I've been able to make a slider joint with a nut in that channel but that only aligns it front to back (paralle to the plate) but it doesn't center it vertically in the channel. Do you have another tip to help with that?

Is it just on my computer or is the audio on your screencast very quite? I had to maximize my volume to just to hear it.