patterns in sketches

kirk_2

Is there a reason not to have patterns in sketches?  Every CAD program I've ever used has them.    The parts I build have a lot of bolt circle holes, and the intuitive way for me is to draw the bolt circle, then a circle centered at a quadrant point, then invoke the pattern specifying the number of copies, angle or equal spacing, and center point (not axis).  Then negative extrusion makes all the holes with one op.

I tried using the center face pattern in OS this morning and found it quite awkward.  And the help pages for this function are not that helpful as the textboxes in the examples aren't readable.  Is there a reason you have to select the faces of the holes as opposed to the perimeters?

kirk_2

The other issue is that I get no feedback on what I did wrong.  Op label turns red and that's it.

jakeramsley

Sketch patterns are in the queue.  They will be in Onshape.

Kirk said:

The other issue is that I get no feedback on what I did wrong.  Op label turns red and that's it.

If you hover over the failed feature there is an error message displayed with it.  

kirk_2

Still can't get a hole pattern generated, as OS doesn't like anything I try to use as an axis.  I made the document  shared with support:

https://cad.onshape.com/documents/c3e09ae6e02c4419ba02565f/w/fa1e5b3decf94da4a43b25e4/e/a7542a954fd341d6b9b938be

Maybe you can show me what needs to be done in this case.  The hover feedback was unhelpful.

abefeldman

@Kirk - We're currently working on a feature based pattern, and sketch patterns as @jramlsey mentioned, but for now the best way to do a pattern is either with a boolean (create your extrude as a separate part, pattern the part, and then boolean subtract the parts generated by the pattern) or with the face pattern option.  With the face pattern option, you have to select all of the faces you want to be patterned - in your case the side and bottom of the hole.

Another quirk you may have encountered is the equal spacing.  We currently equally space throughout the entered angle, so if you had 30 degrees entered, the pattern would try to equally space 8 holes in a 30 degree arc, which would fail.  Entering 360 should give you the result you want.

As I said, we're currently working on improvements to all of these features, and would welcome any feedback you have for using them or the errors you expect to see when something fails.

3dcad

@jramlsey @Abe Is there a reason for not having x, y and z axis? I know you can do linear pattern direction by selecting plane but how about circular or revolving.. Having axis doesn't harm anyone or does it?

david_sohlstrom

I have to agree with 3dcad There should be x,y and z axis by default. Also need to add additional axis when a new plane is added that you need an axis using it and one of the standard planes.

Dave

zach_fine

I don't know what a sketch patterning feature would look like, but I think I could've used one yesterday.

I was trying to design a match for a vent grille pattern that consisted of rows of offset hexagonal holes. I was able to sketch what I needed by making a hexagon, mirroring it to set the start of the offset row above, then using one linear replicator to make them into long rows (about 35x or so) and another replicator to extend the height of the pattern by a few rows. This ballooned the project in filesize and in the amount of processing time needed to make any adjustment after the sketch. But it did work. There may have been a better way to accomplish this -- I'm not very well versed in CAD or in OnShape.

The project might serve as a decent stress test for any upcoming optimization of the polygon or replicate tools.

(Edited to change 'CAT' to 'CAD'. Silly spell-correct.)

Jason_S

As of today, in a new document, you can Feature pattern sketches circularly and linearly. 

Select your sketch, and specify the direction or axis of rotation you wish to pattern in.



see https://cad.onshape.com/help/index.htm#cshid=linearpattern for linear pattern help
https://cad.onshape.com/help/index.htm#cshid=circularpattern for circular pattern help

-Jason