newbie questions

Hi All,

I am a newbie to SW 2004, for some reason when I am sketching the
cursor only changes to an orange dot when hovering over the origin.
In the documentation it says that it should change to a different
cursor when hovering over the origin. I've been getting around this
by setting a coincident relation to the origin. Is there an option to
turn snapping to the origin on or off?

Also, can anyone recommend a good read on sketch relations and
dimensions? Thus far in my self taught learning process I've had the
most trouble with defining geometric relations.

Regards, Bob

 

I'm not sure why you get an orange dot - it should change to the *
indicating a point. You can also turn on the "point" selection filter and
it should pick the origin. Try that and see if it makes a differnce.

As far as sketch relations go, start in the Help section under "sketches,
relations." There it lists the possible relations & the entities that can
utilize it. I even found a couple I didn't know about.

WT

 

Robert

About your involute gears, you can create cycloids, epicycloids,
hypocycloids and trochoids utilizing the same construction techniques
with a circle and dividing a circle tangent to the curve. These are
similar to manual drafting techniques with circles, squares and
triangles.

You also have the ability with Insert, Curve, Helix Spiral to create a
curve that follows archimedes spiral.

The key is to utilize construction geometry and sketch relations to
develop the more complex curves.

I would utilize a configuration in a large assembly, change the
complex tooth profiles to a simplified tooth profile.

By definition two mating gears with have one point of tangency, this
will not work for physical dynamics. So you definitely need a simple
tooth if you want to see how the gears will move.

If you have these complex profiles in another CAD system, import them.
If you have excel spread sheets, you can create the profile by
reading in x, y, z coordinate data to create the sketch.

As far as documentation, SW includes the online tutorials, but you
have to check during installation to install these tutorials. They
are very helpful. I also have 4 pdf files at www.schroff.com, they
cover simple parts, asme standards in the drawing template, large
assembly drawing with configurations. The files are 50 - 100 pages
but will give you an idea on how SW - works.

 

Wayne, I do get the * indicating a point, but it never wants to snap
to that point even when its there. I thought the cursor should turn
into a orange square with the pencil when hovering over the origin.

Regards, Bob