Really need help to improve this model, its surfaces and I think I need to redraw from scratch?

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Permalink Reply by Alex R. Ruiz on January 17, 2012 at 4:07pm

Hi John,

Which version of SolidWorks are you using? It might not be exactly what you are looking for but have you considered using the freeze features command In SOlidWorks 2012? I opened your model and currently, on my POS PC, it took aver two minutes to do a forced rebuild but after I frooze all the features it took less then 5 seconds. This will save you the time required to remodel the entire assembly.

Also, after freezing the features, I was able to scale the entire assembly down using the scale command using the origin to scale about rather the default option of "Centroid". That way all the solid bodies/components scale in relation to each other rather then individually. 

I admit this is exactly an "elegant" solution but it can be a huge time saver.

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Permalink Reply by John Biddleston on January 18, 2012 at 4:21am

Hi Alex,

You are right. I was reading actually yesterday about the new "Freeze" function in SW 2012. As I was trying to find a solution for this issue, I came across the excellent http://www.dezignstuff.com/blog/ which mentioned this. As I result, and also as there is an unrelated but useful function to "explode multibody parts", which would help with a design like this (as I hate having to open the 'bodies' folder, right click on the bodies I want to hide, so that I can edit the multibody part internally) I am now installing 2012 alongside my 2011. I usually wait 6 months, as I like the service packs to 'kick in' as I value stability most over functions. But now SP1 is out, I would imagine any silly bugs have been corrected in this version. 

As to the part. I think that the freeze will be very useful in complex models. But I think that this one is far too complex still. And I think I was given the wrong information by my VAR to use "Surface-Lofts" to build this.,, I am new to surfacing, although I have used SW for 10 years, the workflow is very very different (and harder) than solid modelling. 

My frantic browsing of the internet led me to the suspicion, further, that I should have build it maybe by bisecting the shape into 8 'quaters' and maybe using a combination of "boundary surfaces" and/or "fill surfaces" to make the initial bare bones of the model if you will. This might then provide a better and more sound set of 'thickened' bodies, that shell and thicken correctly, and moreover I can then add other features to, and extrude up to, for example, without problems. With this one, any change to the parametrics and history causes rebuild chaos. And its like fighting fire. It takes me too long to undertake any changes, and I think that I the original surfacing that I did may be fundamentally flawed.

My problem now is, and yes I will use the 'freeze' function (which I think is set as 'off' at default) is to remake the model quickly and elegantly, maybe using another surfacing method, other than 'loft'. It seems that some surfaces are better than others, and some are more 'guessed' by the parametric software. This can cause gaps in the knit, and maybe the horrendous problems that I am having? My problem is now, that I do not understand fully which is better, boundry or fill surface, and there is not much info that I can find on this. My VAR  seems to not know how to approach this, which I think is a little odd. But anyway, I think I need to plan a more simple and elegant surface method, which I can then quickly thicken and add the appropriate features and internal fittings again to. I think that when I get to production issue, this simplicity and better model will also be better for quick modification. For example wall thickness change or adding drafts, change mod etc. 

My new install of 2012 is now at 32%, so a bit of a wait for it to install alongside. I think I will use 2012 for this new multibody version. Currently my best idea, is to build it using boundry surfaces, maybe using 3 profile sketches, and setting the surface edges to 'tangent'. I need the design to look good in this case, so surfacing is a must. Annoying, as if I drew using geometry it would be dead easy. I think that the surfacing route I took though was a dead-end path, and I read that there are usually 3-4 ways to do it, but 3 out of those 4 might cause problems. I am hoping to select the right method.

Many thanks, John

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