Hints & Tips

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 have been unable to attend....

Smooth transition for parting faces

This tip is especially useful for VISI users trying to create a smooth transition when building parting or shut off faces with an eye on manufacture. The ability to create fillet faces in complex conditions is a major strength, but sometimes you need something more...

1. The objective of this example is to create a smooth blend transition highlighted by the yellow curve.

1. The requirement is for a smooth blend transition along the yellow curve

2. The geometrical conditions in this example limit the blending conditions because of the face tangency on the left and the corner point condition on the right.

2. The geometrical conditions limit the blending conditions

3. Although a blend can be applied, the tangency and corner point force the blend to run out to zero. While this may be OK in many scenarios, the objective of this example is to show how a manual construction approach can produce a more desirable result.

3. The tangency and corner point force the blend to run out to zero

4. The actual size of the blend feature we are trying to create is not important as the objective is only to create a smooth transition for CNC toolpaths. This feature is also away from the model geometry (green) which also provides a little creative freedom. In this example, we will use a command called WIREFRAME > OTHER CURVES > OFFSET ON FACES. This command will create an offset curve at a given distance from a reference peripheral edge of a surface.

4. WIREFRAME > OTHER CURVES > OFFSET ON FACES

5. With the new offset curves created, we can use this geometry to trim the original faces to create a constant gap.

5. Trim the faces using the new offset curves

6. With the faces correctly trimmed, there are a number of methods to apply the new blend feature. However, in this example we have used the SOLID > SURFACE TANGENT TO 2 FACES command which will produce a surface tangent to the two sets of faces. The advantage of manually constructing the blend feature in this example is that we can force a linear shape at what was the corner point and an arc shape on the tangecy side. The result is a much better shape for manufacture and removes the possibility of decreasing radii.

6. SOLID > SURFACE TANGENT TO 2 FACES

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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 include them within a future Vero Newsletter.

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