Spring Animation

Hi

Im a second year student doing a form of Automotive eng at Uni, and am
doing my own suspension setup for a side project.

I have modelled springs no problem, however a major part of what i
wanted was to animate the spring damper unit extending and
compressing, however i have searched continuously and have found
nothing.

Could anyone help, this is exactly what i want
but i dont know how to get it. Before refering me to mike wilsons
website please actually describe which component you mean as i cant
find one on there that relates to springs like this.

Thanks for any help

Ben

 

Here are some files I put together 2 weeks ago to show a way to do
it,..

http://www.zxys.com/misc/spring-comp-ani_zxys.zip (sw2006 files)
http://www.zxys.com/misc/spring-comp-ani_zxys.m4v (simple video)

...

 

Look at the Elliptical Spring on page 5. The underlying geometry is a normal
helical spring. (He makes it elliptical by anisotropic scaling.) It looks
like he uses equations to drive the helix. You could do the same, if you
prefer that to Paul's approach.

Jerry Steiger

 

Cool use of Wrap! It hadn't occured to me that you could wrap something
mulitple times around cylinder.

Jerry Steiger

 

Not sure if this has been said already but I like to use the sweep
command to do a helix.... stay with me... not the normal way...
draw a line (the hieght) and a circle on the same plane (different
sketches) make the centre of the circle inline with the bottom of the
line.

now use the sweep tool. the circle should be 90deg out from the normal
way you would do a sweep.
select the path and profile as normal. use the twist/orientation and
choose twist along path.
I use no of rotations but you can specify an angle too.
The path line can be any shape you like... not just a line.

You can drop this into and assebly and use incontext relations to
relate the path (line) to other parts. or just animate the hieght of
the line.

hoep that make sense.
Justin

 

I used macro to change the height of spring and rebuild it. and then
it looks like a actual spring working. If you need I can upload those
files.

Deepak

 

To keep it simple:
Model a spring using standard method of helix and sweep command.
Use equations to relate the height of the helix to the length of an
incontext line in your assembly.
The incontext line, in the case of a compression spring, references
the gap between the two components between which the spring is
installed.
Animate the two components and the spring will update.

Matt

 

Im unclear on this, i have the files but its simular to my situation,
there seems to be no inbuilt way of animating like in your video,
which is exactly what i want. When i try to move the spring stays
solid and the endplate moves up and down. Can you go through exactly
what you did to animate it, step by step?

Deepak, that would be great

 

Maybe someone has a better way or a super fast computer with some
super auto resolve processor running but for the spring to update in
real-time or dynamically or after you just move the piston...I don't
think it's gunna happen.

For the spring to update after moving the piston rod, you have to
REBUILD the model to resolve for the new spring height.
You have to click on the Red/Green light icon, Edit/Rebuild or Ctrl-B.
Again, it does NOT update automatically or dynamically or in real
time.
If you have Animator installed, just click on the Animator1 tab to see
the frame settings... I'm just moving the piston down and up within 3
seconds.

Anyway, the spring geometry is as simple as it gets, no equations, no
macros, no whatever,.. just good ole plain jane geometry, just like a
spring would be wound and with mates driving the height change, as
close to real would as you can get,.. it's not a perfect spring but
close as simple gets.


btw, the help speed rebuilds up,..
- Change the Document Properties/Image Quality/... all to Lower values
or what is visually tolerable.
- Set to Lightweight
- Turn Off "verification on rebuild"
- and,.. get a super computer

...

 

btw, animator will auto-rebuild per frame...

 

Thanks that is brilliant, i am not working on adapting Jerry steiger
^^^'s spring, but cannot seem to relate the hieght of the spring to my
components, he has used a external reference but there seems to be no
way to edit this for my own part. Anyone know a solution?

Thanks again

Ben

 

No worries, worked it out meself, Just had to delete the relation and
make a new respective one for my part

 

Oh, and thank you all, and i appoligise for my silliness in places

 

Here is the link of the avi file of Spring Animation. I will soon
uploading the Solidworks files also.

http://www.uploading.com/files/01ZKLZAZ/Spring_Animation.avi.html

Regards

Deepak

 

Paul,
At SWx World I will be showing a real-time-updating-compression-spring-
workaround based on this thread. I have a pretty slow computer at
home, but on it I developed a 'better way' for animations that I can
extend or compress while dragging the mated components. For those who
can't go, a couple of solutions will be up on the Dimontegroup.com
website a week or so after the show.
Ed

 

Ahmm.... so,.. why can't you just post the data for us to see now???

Why does someone have to go to a show to see this or wait until
after??

...

 

Here is the link of the spring file I have made. Hope it work for the
one looking for it. Pls post your comments/ suggestions to make it
much better.

http://www.uploading.com/files/FC3J2JNW/spring.zip.html

password: SW2007


Deepak

 

Sorry, Paul - I'm just way too busy for the next week. After the show
I have time to clean the models up and get them posted for download.

And I agree - no need to go to the show. Since my first presentation
I have shared everything with folks over our website.

 

and very nice of you too Mr Eaton...looking forward to seeing the latest..
;o)

 

You very mean man, Mr. Eaton... ;^)

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