Hi all,
I am trying to generate a 3D tube in freecad.
My plan is:
- to mark some points and generate a spline through the points. The spline is a 3D spline, i.e. it doesn't lie on any of the Cartesian planess
- to generate the tube of a specific diameter around the spline by sweeping a circle perpendicular to the spline along the spline
I am a new user so I am experiencing some difficulties in performing a very simple task: to orient the circle perpendicularly to the starting point of spline.
Please let me know if you can help me and guide me through this! I found some tutorial on you tube but in all of them the line and the circle lie on the Cartesian planes.
Thank you
Mary
How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
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- DeepSOIC
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- Location: used to be Saint-Petersburg, Russia
Re: How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
Hi!
Use Draft PathArray, it has an Align property which does just that.
EDIT: place your circle in XY plane, with the center at the origin
Use Draft PathArray, it has an Align property which does just that.
EDIT: place your circle in XY plane, with the center at the origin
Re: How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
Hi DeepSoic,
thank you very much for your hint. I think I am very close to my desired result. However, the circles are parallel to the curve, not perpendicular. I have used the align property of PathArray (true & false) but that changes the orientation from parallel to the path to parallel to the XY plane.
How can I set the normal direction? I am attaching my project for your reference.
Thank you very much!
Mary
thank you very much for your hint. I think I am very close to my desired result. However, the circles are parallel to the curve, not perpendicular. I have used the align property of PathArray (true & false) but that changes the orientation from parallel to the path to parallel to the XY plane.
How can I set the normal direction? I am attaching my project for your reference.
Thank you very much!
Mary
- Attachments
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- tube.FCStd
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- DeepSOIC
- Veteran
- Posts: 7896
- Joined: Fri Aug 29, 2014 12:45 am
- Location: used to be Saint-Petersburg, Russia
Re: How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
Well, it turns out my suggestion about XY sketch orientation was wrong , use YZ instead
- DeepSOIC
- Veteran
- Posts: 7896
- Joined: Fri Aug 29, 2014 12:45 am
- Location: used to be Saint-Petersburg, Russia
Re: How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
and before you ask - no, I don't know how to force patharray produce one object, it places two even if I set 1. So you'll have to either use draft downgrade (you are going to loose parametric dependency), or use Part Cut with some box made specially for the purpose to exclude one of the circles.
Re: How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
If you place a sphere at the end of the path, then move|copy it a minute increment along the path, section between the spheres, then move the section back to the end of the path, the result is very close to instantaneously normal to the path.
Re: How to make a circle perpendicular to a randomly oriented 3D spline
hi
uses this macro Macro_WorkFeatures and :
1: cut your line line in 3 parts (or 4 . . .) (your line original is not modified)
2: select 3 points (extremity of your line and a point to choose the lines created
3: create plane of 3 points (plane 1)
4: create plane (plane 2) perpendicular of plane 1
5: select the face plane 2
6: select create sketch of face
7: create your circle and sweep
mario
uses this macro Macro_WorkFeatures and :
1: cut your line line in 3 parts (or 4 . . .) (your line original is not modified)
2: select 3 points (extremity of your line and a point to choose the lines created
3: create plane of 3 points (plane 1)
4: create plane (plane 2) perpendicular of plane 1
5: select the face plane 2
6: select create sketch of face
7: create your circle and sweep
mario
Maybe you need a special feature, go into Macros_recipes and Code_snippets, Topological_data_scripting.
My macros on Gist.github here complete macros Wiki and forum.
My macros on Gist.github here complete macros Wiki and forum.