Turning a surface into a solid body (itp file)

[Anonymous]

I'm working on a project on wind turbines and i'm trying to construct a wing for a vertical axis wind turbine, which i eventually will 3D-print.

I created the wing profile in a program called QBlade and got it in inventor as a .stl file. Later used the mesh enabler add in for Inventor and got a surface consisting of triangles as a .ipt file. Now i'm trying to give the wing volume and later split it in 3 different parts for printing. I haven't been able to give the wing a solid body and volume, and need help on this matter.

Appreciate all answers.

Regards

Torje

[karthur1]

In order for Inventor to make this a solid, it has to be a close profile..... which it is not.  The very tip of this is left open.  Use the Boundary patch tool and select the loop around the edge (make sure the "Auto Edge Chain" is selected.  You may want to turn off the preview just so its easier to select the edges.

Depending on your computer, it may take a while for it complete this.  There are ALOT of faces it will have to compute.

Let us know if you need more help with it.

Thanks,

Kirk

[Anonymous]

You might want to clean this up with Remake before importing into Inventor...

[Anonymous]

Thanks!

I'm new to inventor, so sorry if this is basic knowledge, i appreciate the help.

Did manage to turn it into a complete surface with the boundary patch tool and the stitch tool, see attached file. Now the problem is filling the volume inside with solid matter. I tried using sculpt, but it will only give me the end profile in solid. Also tried selecting different boundary patches with the "Fill void" tool. but that didn't work either.

Regards

Torjee

[TheCADWhisperer]

Are you aware that this is coarsely faceted planar surfaces?

Did you notice the file size?

I think I would use this only as reference and create proper geometry from scratch in Inventor rather than use faceted approximation.

[jtylerbc]

STL is a 3D printing format that breaks the part up into a faceted mesh of surfaces, as @TheCADWhisperer mentioned.  If I understand your plan correctly, you are then modifying the geometry in an Inventor .ipt file, and subsequently exporting it back out as .STL again to print it. 

So, you're taking a mesh that approximates the original geometry, modifying it, then making a mesh that approximates the geometry of the first mesh.  It seems to me like you'd be losing accuracy every time you translate it this way, even if you do manage to get your geometry to close up properly.

I don't see where anyone else questioned this, so I will.  Is .stl the only format that your QBlade program can export?  If not, you would probably be better off with STEP, IGES, DWG, or pretty much anything else.

[dgorsman]

Depending on the type of printer and printing material surface accuracy may be less of an issue (but introduce other problems).  For complex curves I suspect that the most effective results would be to get the surface to a "good enough" state then hand- or tool-finish to get the desired blended contours.

[Anonymous]

Hi! Answering for the creator of this post. Qblade can only export the blade geometry into STL or text format (coordinates). 

[Anonymous]

@TheCADWhisperer, do you have any advice if we were to create the wing from scratch?

[Anonymous]

I cannot open the file (my version is too old), and nor do I have experience with STLs in Inventor......

however, if the newer versions allow you to project intersections of work planes and the 3d mesh model, you might be able to create a load of work planes that slice through the shape, create the intersection geometry as 'construction line type', re-draw the cross section slice with splines, arcs, etc,  then create another 3d sketch or two to use as 'rails' for a sweep or "loft". 

In effect, you'd be making a carcass like a rowing boat's cross sections and asking Inventor to make a smooth transitional shape inbetween the wireframe shape sections.

Others may have a better idea. Maybe there are also more options in Fusion 360 to make a mesh water-tight and into a solid. It is a bit more 'arty-farty' in these kinds of ways with such data. You could try the demo.

[TheCADWhisperer]

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@Anonymous wrote:

....., you might be able to create a load of work planes that slice through the shape,...

.... Maybe there are also more options in Fusion 360 to make a mesh water-tight and into a solid. .....

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That is a common mistake that beginners make.  More sketches does not equate to better geometry.

I suspect that this design could be done with one, or two at the most, sketches.

Fusion is more limited (I seem to recall 10,000 faces limit) than Inventor in converting stl mesh to solid body.

[Anonymous]

I would certainly agree that slicing the thing into too many close sections could lead to quite a horrible result. I suppose it depends on what the original poster expects to achieve and how well it could be re-constructed to achieve the correct properties. I am still using a version of inventor that doesn't have STL capability, so I did not know about the capability differences or what can be done these-days with Inventor. If Inventor has the same kind of tools to stitch up a mesh, and even surpasses Fusion by quite a way, that is great.