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Vehicle coordinate system
martin_kopplow
Member Posts: 691 PRO
Is there any chance we might get a vehicle world coordinate system in Onshape any time at all?
I am at a design job for a vehicle again, and having left and right or front and rear just mixed up, and the X-Axis pointing the wrong direction, is just so annoying.
Fo those who might have missed it:
- In a vehicle (cars, bikes, boats, rockets), when we look at it from the REAR, the direction of movement is away from us to the front, and thus we have the left side on the left and the right side on the right. Everyting is referring to the direction of movement.
- In a static object (buildings, machinery, infrastructure), if we look at it from the FRONT, we have the right side on the right and the left side on the left, so that is just the other way round! Everything is referring to the direction we look at it.
This causes additional effort when exchanging CAD data and makes the view cube, the default work planes and most drawing view names misleading at least. I can't follow client's conventions when it comes to world axis' orientation at that. I am really annoyed by the fact that I have to explain the oddity to everybody looking at my designs time and again. "No, this is called the front view, even though it shows your car from the rear, for I am using an architectural design package for the job!" How professional is that?
Comments
I can understand how that could mess with your head!
I'm going to ask some stupid questions because the more I think about it the more i don't get!
You know onshape isn't an architectural package right? The default works for most of us designing parts and assemblies.
How do your clients know it's called the front view?
Would relabeling the view cube be the solution?
If it's on a drawing would a switch from 1st to 3rd angle do the job?
Why label the drawing views? That's not standard engineering drawing practice, but i guess might be in your line of work.
If it's on the model why can't the rear of the car be at the rear of the model?
Have you raised an improvement request?
What is the proposed solution?
I would soooo extremely support this improvement!
@Ste_Wilson for me it's just a matter of how you interact with the product. If it's something like a phone that you hold or look at the "front" faces you and the "right" is on your right, just like the view cube. When you're doing a car (or bicycle) the "right" side should be the side that's on your right when you are riding, which is currently labeled "left" on the view cube. It is especially important when collaborating, because changing the orientation of a model is next to impossible later in the design process, and I've worked on more than one project where things had confusing names and conversations because of this. Is it "left bracket" or "right bracket"? The cube says left and the object itself says right. Hilarity ensues.
@Ste_Wilson Yes, @EvanReese is about right. It is a matter of consistency throughout the design process and especially the communication about it. In OS we don't just share files any more, we also share viewing rights, that is a client can look into and interact with our design. That makes a huge difference. I older CAD, where I would just have sent an exported model or a drawing in a PDF, it would not really matter (except myswelf and colleagues), but now the client or supplier gets confused, too. I talk to him on the phone or in a video call and I tell him to look at it from the left, and he hits the "Left" label on the view cube and wooosh! he's actually in the right view. I expect to get a mirrored part delivered any time.
Talking drawing views: I don't usually name them, except there is particular reason. Still, when creating a new sheet, Onshape will ask me which view I want to insert, and it asks me about the default view NAME, which will be wrong in 95% of the cases for me. It will also name referenced views, E.G. for section or detail views. So I have a detail view and the prperties dialog says it is based on the left view, but that is actually my right view. Can it get any more confusing?
Then I create a surface from two or more sketch curves: One is the left view and I might call the sketch "Sketch air intake left " but it is viewed from the right, one curve is the top view, one is the front view, which is actually my rear view, or the left view that is the right view. It does not make any sense at all to name views or planes when the naming is not consistent. I'd rather have X-plane, Y-plane and Z-plane with the corresponding X-view, Y-view and Z-view, for that would at least be logical. I'd still take some getting used to, but then it would carry through.
Ste's questions:
Question: If it's on a drawing would a switch from 1st to 3rd angle do the job?
Changing from 1st angle to 3rd angle projection, as proposed, would break yet another convention and only add to the confusion. So that is clearly not valid workaround.
Question: If it's on the model why can't the rear of the car be at the rear of the model?
Answer: Because if it was so, the left of the car would be at the right of the model. One's gotta die one death. Choose one.
Question: Would relabeling the view cube be the solution?
Answer: Yes, if the default planes and view names would also change their labels in the process, it would be a 75% solution. The remaining 25% would be on account of the XYZ axis orientation that could still be off.
I know Onshape isn't meant to be an architectural CAD package, but when this is that case: Why is vehicle design neglected?
I have raised an improvent request long ago, but it appears I am the only one who makes things that move. :0/
@martin_kopplow thanks for taking the time to reply! Makes more sense now! :)
Here's the link to the improvement request I made earlier:
Maybe other automotive/naval/aerospace designers could add their support to it?
No doubt there are hundreds of users (most of them on Education plans) using Onshape to design competition robots: FRC, FTC, Vex and others. Teaching these CAD novices that the orientation of a new robot model should be chosen carefully doesn't carry much weight when "Left" doesn't really mean "Left" . Let's round up some votes.
at Honda we didn't use left and right, we use DR (driver side) and AS (assistant side, for the passenger side of the car, which can reverse depending on country). However almost all of our work was driver side only, except for a few things on the interior, such as the instrument panel (dash).
It is definitely an interesting one, and I've been dealing with it in one form or another, in multiple different CAD and CAE pacakges for the best part of 30 years. The thing is, the are multiple conventions and at least a couple of Standards depending on what part if the design you are talking about. e.g. ISO 4130 (which aligns X+ axis along the car toward the back and Z+ is upwards, though ISO8855 (used for vehicle dynamics) which has X+ along car but toward front, and Z+ upwards)…
I recall at least one (most?) of the US big 3 using this ISO4130, but the next question is the car origin. Some set X=0 at the front of the car, or even in front of the car so all values are +ve, some set it in line with the front axle (common in trucks, especially useful when doing weights and measures calcs), others have some reference origin at some point on the engine, or on the firewall. Z=0 can be at ground level, or not. It depends.
Some conventions flip Z so Z+ faces down. It depends.
But I totally agree there could be a lot more flexibility in choice the names that appear on the viewcube so on…. I'll keep an eye on that improvement request.
@GregBrown Honda defines the Origin as the center of the front axle. negative towards the back, positive towards the front.
I agree with the needs expressed in this discussion. I work in aerospace and aircraft programs almost always use +X is aft along the fuselage, +Y is along the right wing, and +Z is upwards. In other words, the X-Z plane is the symmetry plane of the aircraft. I similarly get the same types of questions from my clients and design partners as this makes the cube "Front" look at the aircraft "Left" and the cube "Left" look at the aircraft "Front", and so on.
Being able to re-label the cube faces and have those names cascade to drawing views would be amazing. We can already rename the default plane, so nothing else would be needed immediately on those.
I've been doing vehicle prototyping stuff for Volkswagen for decades, and they also put the origin on the center of front axle, utility and passenger cars alike. While the origin location is free to choose for a job, it is not specifically important for this discusssion, though. Also, pointing the main axis in whatever direction we like is relatively free already. The main question appears to be whether we use a left-handed or right-handed coordinate system, and whether we can assign view labels to the world planes (and have the cube and the drawing views follow or vice versa).
So, I could imagine that choices as follows should already fix most issues:
The combination of those would provide quite some freedom of choice. It'd be difficult to merge the label settings seamlessly with the axis direction, though. This would probably be a GUI issue in the first place. If there was a settings GUI, with the default world system displayed in the background, and a view cube and axis manipulator overlaid on same origin, that could both be moved and snapped to the valid positions, and clicking on either of the three axis or view lables inverting it, that could possibly go a long way. I might need to illustrate that one to make it clear, but I trust in your imaginative powers for now. Maybe it could be incorporated right into the view cube, by adding an edit mode to it.
I support the idea of a corporate setting for a default world coordinate system, that could be overrun by user.
My description of the common aerospace system may have been too specific. Aerospace does generally use a right-hand coordinate system. Most commonly the coordinate systems for aircraft design use the x-axis along the aircraft longitudinal axis (nose-to-tail direction). However, depending on the project it is common to see the direction as either positive aft or positive forward. There are also some variations between disciplines within aerospace where aerodynamics and flight dynamics design are in one coordinate system and mechanical design is in a different system.
This just reinforces the need to have flexibility to set things up for the company and/or a project with the ability to override defaults when needed.