New Feature: Mate Pattern

imants_smidchens

So I was modeling some regular polyhedra, trying to figure out how to do so in steps I could replicate on a manual milling machine (to make them out of aluminum later), and realized many of the steps were duplicates along different axes, and thought: "why spend 5 minutes doing this manually when I could spend 5 hours automating it?"
you can find the feature here:
https://cad.onshape.com/documents/9c752e0adbf4c48c7d7f03e7/w/d7e93e4064adfa2059de985c/e/840df4768729f2d4c0b339f2?renderMode=0&uiState=62a37179295a0e6ee542bf2b
and it lets you do things like this:

S1mon

@imants_smidchens

I haven't added this yet and gone through the flow, so maybe this would be obvious, but I'm trying to understand how this is different from other tools like Point pattern and MultiMateConnector. It seems like it's a bit of a mash-up between those two. Perhaps you could expand a bit on what problem(s) you were trying to solve?

imants_smidchens

S1mon said:

@imants_smidchens

I haven't added this yet and gone through the flow, so maybe this would be obvious, but I'm trying to understand how this is different from other tools like Point pattern and MultiMateConnector. It seems like it's a bit of a mash-up between those two. Perhaps you could expand a bit on what problem(s) you were trying to solve?

Sure! The main issue I have with Point Pattern is that it always preserves the original rotation (plus requires sketch points/vertices in order to pattern to locations. This is sort of an expansion of that, with all the same base functionality, but also the option to transform using coordinate systems (either mates or determined from sketch point/sketch plane), allowing for patterned instances to have different orientations at each location.

EvanReese

Thanks for Sharing @imants_smidchens. Looks like good work as usual!
Seems similar to transform pattern as well. Is it appreciably different that you're aware of?

imants_smidchens

Evan_Reese said:

Thanks for Sharing @imants_smidchens. Looks like good work as usual!
Seems similar to transform pattern as well. Is it appreciably different that you're aware of?

unfortunately i don't have permissions to view that document, but you are most likely right and this is a duplicate of that!

S1mon

It's frustrating how Onshape Enterprise accounts make sharing FeatureScript links complicated.

Here's the corrected link (hint: if you see anything other than "cad" before onshape.com in the URL, change it to "cad")
https://cad.onshape.com/documents/25a0a6dfaa76e64574a5e0db/w/ed2afaf5bd2d12066495dc84/e/a71ff51699ae36f356a38f69

EvanReese

S1mon said:

It's frustrating how Onshape Enterprise accounts make sharing FeatureScript links complicated.

It really really is.