how do I make a cutout template

[Anonymous]

brand new to 3d modelling and autodesk fusion - so this is probably the first of a succession of dumb questions  however...

My problem:

   *  I have a small bed 3d printer - I want to break lots of things up in a way that they just snap together

My idea:

   * to make tabs - so - suppose I have a flat 3mm thick surface A I want to connect to another flat 3mm surface - then I have 3-5 1mm thick 3mm wide tabs sticking out of each one - some on the top pointing down, some on the bottom facing up ... and on the _other_ side of the surface I have a corresponding hole - so hopefully I align them, push them together and they click in place never to come apart again, and look fairly seamless...

So here is my design for the tab and the hole it will slide into - assuming there's a certain amount of flexibility in the tab:

Now - I get that I can just copy and paste the tab a lot and connect it to the edge of my half object...   but what I don't understand is how do I sort of copy and paste the corresponding "cut out" - that i need to remove from the other half object?  I sort of want to capture the stuff that's not there, and cut that shape into a big solid at various places.

(and generally - is there a better way of doing this, or achieving my aim?)

[Joshua.Aigen]

Hi @Anonymous,

I also recently got a 3D printer, and my recommendation for achieving what you are trying to do is to make test prints. Once you have something that works then incorporate that into your design. It is much faster to iterate on the 3d printer with small components that don't take much time to print. 

As for how todo the copy and paste there are several ways to do that in Fusion, one is simply copy and paste. Another is to insert a file into an existing model several times, though you may or may not want to break the link to the original part. If you right click on the file in your data panel on the far left your should see the option to insert file into existing design. 

Good luck with your learning and please keep posting questions.

Josh