For this newsletter we will take a look at some of the common questions asked where answers are not so obvious. During the training courses, many of these questions are explained but for those who were unable to attend....

Can I obtain a quick and easy graphical view of the parting line ?

This is a good question and whilst there are dedicated tools within the VISI Analysis suite to create the parting line, there is a quick way to obtain a graphical view and quickly visualise any potential problem areas. The trick is to use the DRAFT ANALYSIS option and use only two colour bands with the draft range set to zero.

After defining only two colour bands, selecting the update graphics icon will render the model using two colours. These colours represent either side of the parting line (one for core side and one for cavity side). If colours appear to be on the wrong side, this would indicate a vertical area and should be validated using the other analysis tools such as surface analyser.

Interface know-how

The VISI interface has been updated over the last few releases and following are one or two 'speed-up' tricks that can help us all.

• I believe most users are now using a mouse with a wheel button. I think we all know that pressing the wheel button and moving the mouse will rotate the geometry using the centre of the screen as the application point. However, holding CTRL and using the wheel mouse will rotate the geometry about the active mouse screen position. A similar point is also true of scrolling using the wheel mouse button. Currently, scrolling with the mouse will zoom in/out to the centre of the screen. However, holding CTRL and using the wheel mouse to scroll will zoom to the active mouse screen position

• Activate the last command ? It is very common to require the last command (the one you have just exited). Rather than re-selection from the menu, pressing BACKSPACE will automatically call the lasty command.

• Stepping back through a multi-selection command ? It is very common to have multiple selections within a CAD command (for example, Rotate - select geometry, select rotation axis, select application point and finally the angle of rotation). During this selection procedure, if you make a mistake, instead of exiting the command and restarting, simply press PAGE DOWN to step back through the selection order.

• A new 'Toggle | Add | Remove' option was added to the bottom toolbar. This new option works in conjunction with the window selection. When using the window selection and selecting extra geometry, if an already selected body is re-selected, it was previously unselected. With this new option, it is possible to manage this situation by only adding or removing from the current selection.

If you have any tips or tricks that you would like to share, please email me with a short description (marc@vero.co.uk) and I will add them to a future Vero Newsletter.

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