Can I create a V Groove at Sheet Metal fold line?

[Anonymous]

Hi All, 

I am working with the 30 day trial of Inventor 2016 to see if it would be a good fit for me.  I manufacture with mainly 0.125" thick aluminum sheet.  I use a CNC router to cut out parts and v groove engraving lines where all of the bends will occur for my enclosures.  My first question is:  Can I setup my folding lines on a sheet metal part to reflect a routed v groove (.090" deep in 1/8" thick material) so the bending gain of the fold is less than the thickness of the material?

Thanks

Stuart

[johnsonshiue]

Hi! I think I fully understand your request. I was simply offering some suggestion. Indeed, there is no workflow to do exactly what you are looking for in Inventor at the moment. The request is somewhat unique. I am not sure if it is high on our list of issues to resolve in Sheet Metal. You may want to check Ideas forum and see if this idea has been submitted (or submit a new one).

BTW, please refrain from typing in all-cap letters. It looks as if you are yelling at people.

Many thanks!

[philip1009]

Here's my idea post I created a while back, head over and vote for it to let Autodesk know that it's wanted:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/support-for-v-groove-and-backrouting-in-sheet-metal-co...

Unfortunately the best workflow as others have suggested that can be done is to change the sheet metal thickness to the leftover material after v-grooving, at a previous company I worked at the material was shrunk down to .005 to minimize errors to within tolerance.  You just had to keep the actual material thickness in mind when making assemblies, adding the left over material as a gap in constraints, etc.  In any case where v-grooves were used, the flat patterns had to be edited in Autocad to match tested corner notch templates and to add the additional v-groove lines for the CNC software, in that companies case, Radan was used to code the routing machines.

It basically required 2 teams of drafters to realize the workflow of the panels, one team to model and draw the parts in Inventor, then edit the flat patterns when needed in AutoCad, then the other team coded and nested the patterns in Radan.  It is a major pain especially when a group of panels need to be changed later on.

Showing the actual v-grooves isn't really necessary imo, just support negative bend radii in the sheet metal defaults and support different bend lines (normal bends vs. v-groove bends) as different layers when exporting to dxf.

[IgorMir]

Hi Philip,

No, I don't think it requires two teams to create a part. It requires a bit of planning. One person is enough for it. Here is a simplified model and a flat pattern drawing of it. IV2018 format. Modifying Part1 affects the corresponding flat pattern. No AutoCAD is needed. Granted - it is a bit more complicated than just an ordinary sheet metal part but then again - how often is there a requirement for such a design?

Cheers,

Igor.

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@philip1009 wrote:

Here's my idea post I created a while back, head over and vote for it to let Autodesk know that it's wanted:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/support-for-v-groove-and-backrouting-in-sheet-metal-co...

Unfortunately the best workflow as others have suggested that can be done is to change the sheet metal thickness to the leftover material after v-grooving, at a previous company I worked at the material was shrunk down to .005 to minimize errors to within tolerance.  You just had to keep the actual material thickness in mind when making assemblies, adding the left over material as a gap in constraints, etc.  In any case where v-grooves were used, the flat patterns had to be edited in Autocad to match tested corner notch templates and to add the additional v-groove lines for the CNC software, in that companies case, Radan was used to code the routing machines.

It basically required 2 teams of drafters to realize the workflow of the panels, one team to model and draw the parts in Inventor, then edit the flat patterns when needed in AutoCad, then the other team coded and nested the patterns in Radan.  It is a major pain especially when a group of panels need to be changed later on.

Showing the actual v-grooves isn't really necessary imo, just support negative bend radii in the sheet metal defaults and support different bend lines (normal bends vs. v-groove bends) as different layers when exporting to dxf.

[philip1009]

It basically had to do with the way Inventor wanted to do non-90 deg. corner notches vs. what was needed for composite/backrouted panels in order for them to form correctly, there were no settings available for the corner notches we wanted, so they usually had to be fixed in Autocad, unfortunately I don't have any examples to show here, but believe me, I tried to get to using just an Inventor route, but there wasn't an acceptable solution found, and Autocad was always used for backrouting since we had to change the appropriate bend layers so they were coded in Radan correctly.  You're right that it doesn't usually require 2 teams, it just ended up being that way to deal with the capacity of parts and that not everyone on the team had the same skill set, others were faster in Radan while others were faster in Inventor and Autocad.

[IgorMir]

Hi Philip

I would be interested to have a look at your real time design. Maybe one day, when it become available...

Cheers,

Igor.

[philip1009]

I should have clarified, I don't have examples because this is from a company I don't work for anymore and I don't have access to the notch examples they needed for forming instead of what Inventor would put out.  I'll see if I can come up with an example with what knowledge I still have from that employer.