Knurling in a solid model 2

[triggerguard1]

What's the quickest and easiest way to apply cosmetic knurling to a sold part? It needs to wrap around and object that's 1.250" in diameter.

Appreciate any help you guys can offer.

 

[SBaugh]

I don't know about the cosmetic knurl, but I have a knurled part from Jim Patrick on my site

http://www.scottjbaugh.com

I don't know if that will help or not.

Good Luck,

Scott Baugh, CSWP
3DVision Technologies

http://www.3dvisiontech.com

http://www.scottjbaugh.com

faq731-376
When in doubt, always check the help

 

[triggerguard1]

That's exactly what I'm looking for, but how did he do it
? Do you have any idea?

 

[MadMango]

If you download the zipped model, you should be able to open it up and take a look and the FM (feature manager) tree to see how it was constructed.

Also Scott, you might want to specifiy what version solid models are listed on your site. I know it's gonna be a pain, but ti would be really helpful.

Wanna Tip? faq731-376
"Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities."

 

[Theophilus]

Triggerguard1,

The way I've done this in the past is to extrude your outer diameter cylinder. Then create a helical curve that you can use in a cut for your knurl. (I normally set the curve to the depth of the knurl I want, then pierce a V-shaped profile on the helix at the vertex.)

Sweep a cut along your helical path. Create an appropriate circular feature pattern. Now do the same with a helical curve rotating the opposite direction. The result is a very slow-to-rebuild great-looking knurl. (You may want to export to parasolid and then bring it back in to speed things up on the rest of your model if your knurling is fixed and you don't expect to make changes to that area.)

Hope that helps,




Jeff Mowry
DesignHaus Industrial Design

http://www.designhaus-i-d.com

 

[triggerguard1]

Jeff,
Thanks, that's exactly what I was thinking, but have been vegging all weekend, so I haven't given it whirl yet. I know it's kinda slow to rebuild, but I'm running a pretty hot system, so it's not bad. The main thing, is that I've got an item for patent and I've got some potential investors who want to take a look at it, so I don't want them to have to visualize anything. It needs to be just like the real thing. Thanks a million.

Matt

 

[drawoh]

triggerguard1,

Knurling sounds like a marvellous way to stop your video card dead in its tracks.

What I do with knurled surfaces is go into the face properties and and mess with the colour. Specifically, I set the specularity to a low value. This gives a reasoable impression of knurling, and it does not chew up video updates.

JHG

 

[triggerguard1]

I've got a Matrox Mellenium G550 and have put it to the test with multiple thread profiles on assemblies of as many as ten parts without any problems. It shouldn't give me any hassles, but I'll sure keep specularity in mind if I do get into trouble.

Matt

 

[drawoh]

triggerguard1,

An assembly with ten parts is nothing. I have an assembly here with something over 2000 parts, and I resent it when people generate complicated sub-assemblies for me to attach.

If your company designs only stuff that is simple, you can go nuts with detail. If it winds up as part of something bigger, you must think of the other guy's video card and RAM. Not all of us have the latest computers.

JHG

 

[triggerguard1]

JHG,
I see where you're coming from, but the good part is, I'm the only one that uses these files, and they are on the small side. I'd probably go nuts running 2000 parts in an assembly. How many damned mates do you have??LOL. That's got to be a mess.

Fortunately, most, if not all of my parts are very simple. Some are a little tricky, but still relatively easy compared to what some of you poor guys have to do. But, with any luck, this simple part is going to let me retire before I reach thirty. I've got a year and half till I'll be in Cabo San Lucas drinking Sammy Haggar's Cabo Wabo.
Basically, it's not the size of your assembly that matters, it's how you sell it.

 

[dugudugu]

Scott,
The zip file to the knurled part from Jim Patrick is . Please advise how I may view this file.

Dugu

 

[SBaugh]

You have to Unzip the file and then open the SW file in SW. I don't know what version it was made in.

Regards,

Scott Baugh, CSWP
3DVision Technologies

http://www.3dvisiontech.com

http://www.scottjbaugh.com

faq731-376
When in doubt, always check the help

 

[JNR]

Sounds like you are going into some slow detailing knowingly and with good reason. (Helix's along are abismally slow and not just for graphics.) It is a similar issue to threads and springs. I do suggest that if you find you run into a problem with speed, make a "quick" configuration of the parts for everyday use that has a plain cylinder with some very simple indicator that it is knurled. Then you just switch configurations when you need the cool looking one. There was a spectacular demonstration of this at SW World I. It was a simple box containing a couple of hundred copies of the same spring.

We just indicate the knurl on the final drawing with a sample patch.

3/4 of all the Spam produced goes to Hawaii - shame that's not true of SPAM also.......

 

[Theophilus]

By the way, if you don't need to make many edits to your part after modelling it, I recommend exporting the part as a parasolid. Open the parasolid and use that file for your assemblies, etc. to speed things up. Otherwise the helical features can really bog things down.




Jeff Mowry
DesignHaus Industrial Design

http://www.designhaus-i-d.com

 

[TheTick]

For a knurl I typically do not model knurl geometry.

Instead, I model the knurled portion at max O.D. and apply a cosmetic thread. On drawings, I might apply crosshatch for effect. This is usually sufficient since, like threads, most knurls are standardized and can be described adequately with a dimension and a callout.

All this machinery making modern music can still be open-hearted.

 

[SnowCrash]

Triggerguard wanted to do a cosmetic knurl and nobody helped him out. Do a 3D sketch of the single grooove you want and repeat and mirror as needed.

Crshj 'Sheesh" Johnson

 

[J-C]

In 2004, you can apply a Knurled texture to the face of the part. Doesn't show in shaded drawings however. Not sure if that's a bug or not.

Jason Capriotti
ThyssenKrupp Elevator

 

[triggerguard1]

I got her figured out a while back with good success.

Unfortunately, yesterday I got hit with a virus I think, but maybe it's just a crappy hard drive. Weird thing is, I'm using the computer right now. The hard drive says that is has zero kilobytes used and zero available. Basically, it thinks it doesn't exist. The real bad part is, I've got all my solidwork models on this damn thing, along with my Quickbooks files. Needless to say, it's been a bad day.

 

[Mindnumb]

I guess you have found out how to do it by now, just wanted to give you a little hint if you run into performance issues...

This is what I have done on large assemblys with loads of transport containers with profiled side plates.

1. model one sideplate
2. render image of sideplate with photoworks (put on
appropriate lightning and color)
3. Apply image as texture with photoworks on the
simplified containers. Looks like the real thing.


You could probably make the knurl image part on a flat surface with straight lines diagonally. the resulting image will hopefully wrap nicely round the knurled surface you specify.

to view it real time toggle on interactive rendering in photoworks.

 

[JNR]

Snowcrash, I know you meant well by your comment, but I'm not sure it is fair to say nobody helped him. Many people gave a lot of constructive suggestions to what they believed might be the real issue and gave the benfit of much collective experience in dealing with similar things thoughout the entire process. If all we did was specifically answer questions using very narrow and literal interpretation we whould probably leave people often doing very inefficient things which did not truely solve the overall problem. Besides, broadening the scope a bit most often helps everyone to learn some thing useful and improve overall efficiency ;-)

3/4 of all the Spam produced goes to Hawaii - shame that's not true of SPAM also.......