Moving an edge using the MOVE tool: not anymore?

[p_cordierVEMDG]

Hi all,

I'm getting back to Fusion 360 after a while. I started a new project in which I need to move an edge using the move tool. But when I do so, it selects the whole body. Months ago, in a previous project, I'm 95% sure I could do that. Select an edge, click the move tool and drag the arrow of the axis I wanted, with the possibility to enter an offset value... Is it me with a false memory or did they removed this function?!?

This is crazy, I could swear it was possible before.. weird.

Thanks, Phil.

[HughesTooling · Accepted solution]

No you've never been able to move edges of a body. You have move face so you can rotate a face as well as move. You might be thinking a forms when talking about moving an edge. EDIT Looking at your picture you could rotate that face using the edge at the bottom. PS Please don't attach pictures, just paste them into you message.

[p_cordierVEMDG]

Many many thanks for the prompt reply! Well I guess my memory played a trick on me...
That being said, it would be a very handy feature. 😄

[TheCADWhisperer]

@p_cordierVEMDG 

Perhaps you were thinking of Moving (Rotating) Faces?

[p_cordierVEMDG]

No, I knew of rotating faces. But in the meantime I found out where I got this idea from: MODO. It's a modeling software meant for video games and films, not engineering. By its nature it's heavily oriented towards hard surface modeling and has therefore tons of awesome features. Among them are vertices and edges moving, just like you move a surface in Fusion. It's awesome and would totally make sense in Fusion. Plus I think it doesn't require a ton of development.

Thank you for your help!

[jeff_strater]

"It's awesome and would totally make sense in Fusion. Plus I think it doesn't require a ton of development."

I won't disagree on the first point, but I will on the second.  Yes, it would be great to have the ability to move edges.  However, implementing this would be a huge investment.  And, the main reason is in your description of MODO:  "It's a modeling software meant for video games and films, not engineering".  Fusion supports analytic geometry such as cylinders, planes, tori, etc.  However, if we allow edge moving, you can see that those types of geometry could change their nature.  Imagine twisting the edge of a box.  That could potentially change the nature of planar surfaces on 4 sides of the box from planes to a curved surface (presumably NURBS or some other representation).  I don't know anything about MODO, but I suspect that it (and other similar tools), represent all surfaces as NURBS (even planes and cylinders), which makes it pretty easy to make this type of edit (just changing some of the control points of the surface), while in Fusion, that is not so easy.  There are benefits to keeping the analytic geometry definitions (precision, simplicity, performance), so we are not interested in getting rid of those.  The current face-based edits, you will notice, do not change the basic definition of either the surface being edited, or adjacent faces.

If you haven't already, I suggest you check out the Form workspace, which does implement this kind of edit paradigm (you can edit any face, edge or vertex in the model).

[p_cordierVEMDG]

Hello Jeff and thank you for your very exhaustive reply.

I guess there's no argument possible with an Autodesk software architect! 😉 Not being in your shoes prevents me from measuring the implications of the programming of such a tool.

However from my very own user perspective, I don't see how adding that feature would be that much different from rotating the face of a cube. All other faces change too, but I understand that when doing so, other edges move too and this prevents adjascent surfaces from getting buckled.

Maybe I just answered my own question! 😂

Anyway, it's great to have people from Autodesk taking the time to explain things, I wish it were the same with Adobe...! Thanks again for your time!

PS: I'll give a shot to the Form workspace. Thanks!