Suggestion: Patterning parts with spline points for control

tony_459

Linear and circular patterns are great but limited to systems with symmetry. Even the regular patterning we now have along a spline assumes too much "symmetry"—namely in the spacing between part copies and in their relative orientations. 

We need a feature for general patterns—those spread over a spline, sure, but at irregular intervals and with irregular changes in orientation. 

I am neither a developer nor a CAD expert, but I have a thought. Use spline points to determine where to place part copies and use spline tangents at those points to determine part orientations (or at least provide the option). Or maybe use the points of a polyline instead for position with separate lines specified for orientation. You get the idea. 

Maybe total nonsense, but still, there it is, a thought.

lana

This sounds like a specific need, best addressed by a custom feature. 

tony_459

SolidWorks seems to think it's important enough to have a feature for it. It isn't that unusual for a part to have an irregular pattern.

I just spent the last two days creating sketches so that I can define mates to use in specifying transforms to copy parts---one by one---at irregular intervals and angles along a spline. The SolidWorks feature would probably dash that time into an hour or two in my case, tops.

konstantin_shiriazdanov

the feature you looking for is Point Pattern, it has nothing to splines itself, but the problem is that points do define position but not the orientation, so it doen't help you much.You can look at my Transfrom pattern FS, which uses mate connectors to define orientation, but it still requares manual definition for each mc.