Monthly Archives: December 2011

iLogic Code Writing and Testing in a Semi-Transparent Model

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iLogic Code Writing Tutorial - Image-01When writing iLogic code in Autodesk Inventor, you need to test the code constantly to assure that it is behaving as expected in your model. Some of what is happening would normally be hidden from view. The answer to that problem is to have a semi-transparent model while testing. Here’s how to do it….

 

For this tutorial on iLogic code I have used the table from the Shaker Table Tutorial for this how-to, but any part with multiple solid bodies will do.

 

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iLogic Tutorial for Creating Min/Max Design Limits in Autodesk Inventor

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iLogic Tutorial Image-01 - Autodesk Inventor's iLogic BrowserWe will be using the Shaker Table created in an earlier iLogic tutorial as a base for this one, so if you haven’t completed it, I suggest you do so —it is geared towards beginners, and shouldn’t take too long.

This  iLogic tutorial was created to answer a reader’s inquiry as to “how to make the mortises auto-update when the tenon changes” when designing mortise and tenon joints. This has been accomplished. The table’s dimensions can easily be manipulated via the Parameter Editor.

Changing the Apron_Width parameter will automatically change the tenon width because we used the -( Apron_Width – ( Tenon_Shoulder * 2 ul ) ) formula to create the distance between the two planes that describe its width extents.  The Tenon_Shoulder parameter used in the formula is a driven dimension placed on one segment of a group of three equal segments constrained to the thickness of the apron. As the apron thickness changes, the tenon remains exactly 1/3 of the thickness, and that dimension is transferred via the driven dimension to the mortise in the Leg solid.

 

iLogic Tutorial Image-02 - Adding parameters for the iLogic code to come

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Inventor Color and Materials Creation Tutorial

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In the last installment of this tutorial, we left off with the Shaker Table having a new Inventor Material and Color applied, but things look all caddywhompus due to the way Autodesk Inventor color is applied. In this post we will fix the colors to make everything look copasetic…

Like almost every function in Autodesk Inventor, there more than one way to skin this cat. Inventor color overrides can be applied at the feature level by right clicking on a feature in the Browser Bar, or by doing the same to a solid  body in the Solid Bodies folder –which would add the  override to all of the features contained within said solid, or by selecting one or more faces in the modeling environment.

For this exercise, we will be using the third method, selecting faces. What you need to do is select all (or as many as you can in one go) faces that have the grain going the wrong way by selecting the first face, then holding down the Ctrl key and selecting more. When you have them all, or as many as you can, right click anywhere in the modeling environment and choose Properties…

 

Inventor color tutorial image-01

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Inventor Material and Colors Creation Tutorial

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In this very basic tutorial we will be creating several new Inventor colors and a new Inventor material based on stock items found in Inventor’s extensive material library. There is far more that can be done via the Styles Editor, but we will just stick to doing what is necessary to make wood look realistic in Inventor. The only problem I foresee is that some of you may not have the correct permissions to proceed, but here we go regardless…

I will be using the Shaker Table from the Designing a Shaker Table with Autodesk Inventor tutorial as an example, so you may want to start with that if you haven’t already done so.

As I stated before, you need to check your permissions to make sure you have Read-Write capabilities. If not, you would be able to create the material and color, but they would be stored in the document that is open when they are created, and you will not be able to apply them to future parts. To get started, with nothing open in Inventor, click on the Projects icon on the Launch panel of the Get Started tab to bring up the Projects editor…

 

Inventor material tutorial image-01 - Change Autodesk Inventor's permissions to read write

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Inventor Tutorial for Designing a Shaker Table – 7 – Multi-Solids Notes

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Inventor Tutorial #7 image-01There was a bit of confusion regarding solid creation in Chapter 5 of this Inventor tutorial for a Shaker Table , so I think I’ll give a little wrap-up post regarding solid bodies before moving on to iLogic.

As of version 2010(?) Autodesk Inventor has included the ability to create multiple solid bodies within single parts. It is much like a small assembly –with the huge exception of the ability to create cross-part dependencies that are both stable and responsive. I don’t want to go too far down that road at the moment, but, in a nutshell all of the features in our model are grouped into 13 Solid Bodies, each of which containing one or more features. For example, the Leg A Solid Body contains these four features:

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Inventor Tutorial for Designing a Shaker Table – 6 – Patterning the Solids

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Now for some fun stuff, the patterning of the solids that were created in the previous Inventor Tutorial. All of the patterning will involve mirroring, and all of the mirrors will use the models origin planes as their center –which makes for a very robust model…

..but before we get to the patterning, I placed the one “out of the box” so-to-speak detail to the piece. The chamfer on the underside of the top. I went with a ½” chamfer for now, but will likely tweak things a bit later. Most things are not written in stone in parametric modeling (if things are done correctly). The Chamfer is pretty self-explanatory. Click on the Chamfer tool, then either start selecting edges then size, or vice versa…

 

An Inventor tutorial showing how to cut the chamfer on the table top

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