generating a cut path for plasma cutter

david_rysdam

I've got a part composed of a bunch of polygonal faces at various 3D angles. Using the mate connector trick, I've managed to generate each face as a separate "part" so I can get a face-on drawing of it. Now I want to generate a path for the plasma cutter to cut them out for me. Do I want to use a drawing for this or is there a better way?

Obviously I'd like to pack the parts somewhat efficiently to minimize waste. But when I put the parts into the drawing, I can't shift and turn them around to get a good packing. I can only do "engineering drawing views". Do I need a different mode or system or drawing type or something? Maybe I should export the DXF of each part drawing individually and combine them externally to OnShape?

dennis_20

@david_rysdam ,
Could you create an assembly of the parts with their faces oriented the way you want them to appear in the drawing?

david_rysdam

I could, but there's about 20 parts and it seems like I'd be doing a lot of work to fool OnShape into doing what I want. I wonder if I can export them individually as DXFs and combine/lay them out in Inkscape.

brucebartlett

david_rysdam said:

I could, but there's about 20 parts and it seems like I'd be doing a lot of work to fool OnShape into doing what I want. I wonder if I can export them individually as DXFs and combine/lay them out in Inkscape.

Yes as long as the faces are flat that would be easy. Not need even to split anything up. Just RMB on the face and export as dxf. You could use inkscape to re compile in the flat or another option maybe draftsight.  Hopefully soon we can just use Onshape drawings.

andrew_troup

david_rysdam said:

I've got a part composed of a bunch of polygonal faces at various 3D angles. Using the mate connector trick, I've managed to generate each face as a separate "part" so I can get a face-on drawing of it. ...

Could you expand on this? Sounds interesting...

david_rysdam

You mean the mate connector trick? Sure. I made a new Part Studio and put a big "slab" in there and added some widely-spaced mate connectors. Then I added a "derived" object from real Part Studio. On each face I want to generate a drawing of I put another mate connector. Then I use the "Transform" thing to make a copy of the part such that the mate connector of the relevant face mates with one of the mate connectors on the slab. 

That still wasn't enough to trick OnShape into letting me make a drawing, though. So I made a sketch of the face of the slab and used the Projection operator to grab the lines of the part faces. Extruded those and then I made the drawing from that.

Once I got the rhythm it actually only took me a few minutes to do. But then I was lucky that my ~20 faces were actually only 5 unique shapes. 

andrew_troup

@david_rysdam
very crafty! thanks for that. The only thing that's puzzling to me is the failure to appear in a drawing.
Is the original body which you chose in the "derive" operation a solid part, or a surface body?
And was it modelled in Onshape, or imported?

david_rysdam

Modeled in onshape. The reason it doesn't show up is...complicated to explain in text.  Make a solid body like in this comment and try to make drawings of the faces and you'll see. Or if you are able to do it, report back here and tell me how.

On edit, I see that comment was from you. So....uhh....are you able to make a drawing of those faces? (Obviously when it is a regular polyhedron you only need one, but in the general case you might need 20.)