Need help troubleshoot split object

[Bajicoy]

Hello! Thank you for taking the time to read this post, I was not entirely sure how to title it but in brief, I am having trouble splitting floors in the house below.

I designed the house below to split like a layered cake to ease printing it out. Unfortunatly, the first and second floor will not split as easily as the basement and third floor. Instead, the split command of the first and second floor return an error stating that no meaningful result was achieved.

The more eagle eyed of you might notice that in the foyer that parts of the internal walls are already split along the stair case and I believe this might be what is causing the error as inventor probably thinks I am trying to resplit an existing line. I linked the file down below for any of you who might need a closer inspection.

The combine and stitch tools would not allow me to select individual faces and the patch tool allowed me to select the partial seam between the floors but I could not figure out where to go from there.

Maybe I am wrong about this being the source of error preventing me from splitting the building but I would greatly appreciate any opinions on the matter at least to get rid of the ugly lines in the model.

Thanks! Feel free to ask if there was any info needed on the model.

[Anonymous]

Can you send some screen cast video ?

[johnsonshiue]

Hi! The solid body created by the derived assembly checks poorly. There are duplicate vertices and loop errors. Split simply makes bad body even worse. Could you attach the source assembly (iam and ipt files)? I suspect there are pre-existing bad bodies in the parts.

Many thanks!

[Bajicoy]

Roger that, I linked the original, a tad bit concerned because I don't want to go through the process of recreating all the windows from scratch.

Really appreciate the help on the mess I made

[Bajicoy]

I attached a screen cast of the odd seam in the middle of the house that I suspect is stopping me from making the cake style split. Sadly, my recording program doesn't record the pop ups so let me know if there is anything that you'd like to see in particular.

Hope this helps!

[JDMather]

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@Bajicoy wrote:

I designed the house below to split like a layered cake to ease printing it out. ..

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What is the build envelop size for your printer?

If you do a Manage>Rebuild All on the original file - does Inventor return any errors?

[JDMather]

Any time you find yourself creating repeated dimensions - you should think to yourself, "There has got to be an easier way 17 years into the 21st century - I better stop here and ask some questions."

[JDMather]

Ouch!

I just took a look at the derived part.

I think that it might be a good idea to investigate the use of Sketch Blocks as well.

Also, using multi-body solids techniques (right from the beginning) would negate the need for Split.

[Bajicoy]

So the model I intend on printing is 76.2x76.2x100.5 mm or 3x3x4 inches rather than whatever the 35x35x40 foot building in the original model, my printer is 220x220x240 mm large or 8.66x8.66x9.44 in. I designed the original unscaled because it was easier for me to draw the floor plan in feet but scaled it down to a printable size in a new model to design the windows for my metric printer. First time I had to learn how to rescale something in inventor but it beats punching in a thousand zeros for every line.

Manage doesn't give a Rebuild All option for me. There was a refresh option and it gave back zero errors. Running 2018.

As for repeated dimensions, good catch. Would you recommend using the equal constraint or repeat pattern tool in the future? My eyesight isn't great so I prefer seeing all my dimensions and I draw the line for repeats at the limit where my computer can't copy and paste anymore.

By sketch blocks, are you referring to construction lines? I use them on occasion but I suppose if I am asking that question that I don't really know anything about them.

First time I am hearing about multi-body solids techniques. I suppose it is something I can practice with my next model. Assemblies gave me a poor opinion of working with its form of multi-bodies in initial part design. Still would prefer to not undo all the windows on the building because that was the bulk of the work.

sorry for the long reply and I really appreciate your look into the matter!

[JDMather]

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@Bajicoy wrote:

... I designed the original unscaled because it was easier for me to draw the floor plan in feet ....

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Yes, that is the proper way to do the initial model 1:1 scale.

I just wanted to be sure that you know your thinnest feature after Derive>Scale is going to be about 1mm thick.

[JDMather]

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@Bajicoy wrote:

....Manage doesn't give a Rebuild All option for me. There was a refresh option and it gave back zero errors. 

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Where are you seeing this "Refresh" option?  I don't know were that is?

When I open your un-scaled Cube House 2 file that you attached here and go to the Manage tab and click Rebuild All - I get a long list of errors.

These errors are also indicated by an i in a circle in the browser.

Any time you get an error like this you should STOP and fix the issue first.

[JDMather]

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@Bajicoy wrote:
...By sketch blocks, are you referring to.....

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Sketch Blocks allow you to easily control complex sketch geometry without having to fully define every dimension (although maybe you should anyhow).

For things like your stairs - this would really help out.

You are going to have to start over anyhow - so maybe create sketch blocks from all of your sketches and then copy and paste into new file as you start over on this design.  It will go much faster than you might think.

Usually I opt to pattern features rather than sketch entities, but for the stairs I would probably sketch them as you did but add Equal (=) constraints.  That way you have only one dimension for the Rise and one dimension for the Run. 

 

[JDMather]

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@Bajicoy wrote:
...First time I am hearing about multi-body solids techniques. I suppose it is something I can practice with my next model.

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Your next model will be this one.  Start over.  Don't worry it will go fast using Sketch Blocks and Multi-body, and it will work.

Ask questions at the first sign of trouble.

There is no reason to Combine solids when you are going to turn around and Split them.

 

Just make sure you tell Inventor in each Extrude operation which solid body you are operating on (actually - if you are only operating on one level - you can turn off the visibility of the other levels and Inventor will automatically know which one(s) you are working on).

[johnsonshiue]

Hi! I don't think you have to redo everything. The key here is to find out the source of the bad body. It could be one of the source bodies or it is probably the resultant body from the derive assembly. Without the source, there is no way to tell. Please attach the source assembly (iam and ipt files) so that experts can take a look and figure out where the problem is. If you don't want to share it in public, please feel free to send them to me directly johnson.shiue@autodesk.com.

Many thanks!

[Bajicoy]

Thanks for the double check, 1mm is surprisingly thicker than it sounds. Also a relief to hear I did initial scale right.

My bad on the confusion with the manage>repair all. I thought you were referring to the other manage that dropped down from file.

I forgot the other one on the ribbon existed because I don't pass by it much. I'll be sure to use the repair all tool more often to check my work. Thanks a ton for showing me this.

I appreciate the guides on how to Create Blocks and Multi-Bodies. Certainly not happy having to restart when the model was practically done haha. Oh well, good practice is never easy. For now, I'll just create copies of the model and see if I can forcefully cut each floor with extrusions and while my cake is in the oven I'll set about preparing the next from scratch. I was probably going to print 2 copies of this anyways at least to iron out any kinks from the printer.

Thanks for the help! These tips and tricks will go a long way for the models I like to make.