You can follow the linked constraints from the first line to the last. Give it a shot. Now select the second line and hit the delete button. Every line downstream has now lost its link to the only line that has a Vertical Constraint…
If you have a large layout with many hundreds of lines, you now have a lot of lines that can rotate freely until they are re-constrained vertically –if they are re-constrained vertically! Remember, this is what you will likely be seeing onscreen…
If we were to constrain the endpoint of any of the non vertically constrained lines and drag its top endpoint sideways, it, and all of the lines that are parallel constrained to it will go batshit crazy…
In the real world, finding all of the missing constraints and re-constraining them correctly would be a total pain. There is a very good chance something will be missed and will likely be found while running iLogic rules. If it happens too far down the line, such as while the model is running in a headless environment in an ERP system, the results could be pretty catastrophic.
In addition to the daisy chaining problems, you can waste a lot of time drawing lines that are making themselves parallel to lines that are not parallel to the origin to begin with. I’ve seen entire sketches that were just a tad skewed, which will cause huge problems down the line in models that have features that are created using the origin plane to get right angles.
So without further adieu, set the constraint placement priority to Horizontal and vertical…
Application Icon > Options > Sketch (Tab) > Constraint placement priority > Horizontal and vertical
With this kick-ass setting, lines that should be horizontal or vertical are horizontal or vertical –and they will remain that way because they are constrained to the Origin Planes –not each other!
With this setting you can still draw a line at an angle where needed, then if you draw another line at a similar angle you will get a parallel glyph in that instance (which seems to be a far more correct way of doing things). You can also cancel all inferred constraint glyphs by pressing Ctrl while drawing the line if need be.
The only exceptions to this rule (that I ever use) would be kinetic modeling where there are moving (arcing or rotating) parts (beyond just resizing), and when creating sketch blocks. In fact, one of the things they stressed in the official Inventor training was to never daisy chain constraints —— yet the program is set to do so right out of the box!
If anyone has other instances of where Parallel and perpendicular priority would be advantageous –or why you agree they are the spawn of the devil, I would love to hear them. I have a few horror stories that I may share in the comments.
Later
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Yeah, the parallel and perpendicular thing is annoying, but the really big problem that I have is that when I press CTRL while laying out sketch geometry, I still get at least half of the constraints showing up and have to go back and delete them one by one. Annoys the hell out of me. Doesn't matter whether I'm using L or R CTRL on the keyboard or the CTRL button on the Spacepilot … it just doesn't work.
Hi Rusty,
I agree. There are lots of little things that don't work as they should, but never seem to be fixed. One of these years they need to just bite the bullet and fix all of the outstanding glitches instead of trotting out yet more semi-functioning features.
Mark
Sorry, but I can't see any problem
Well, you get what you play for. good luck with that…
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