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Loft Feature - Guide curves

Question asked by Gencosman Sahin on Dec 11, 2018
Latest reply on Dec 12, 2018 by Gencosman Sahin

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Hello all,
I'm still trying to get better with the loft feature, half the time i try to use some curves to guide the loft feature i do something wrong and the feature fails. Inside the attachment you can find my most recent attempt to figure it out but i still have no idea about whats wrong with it. I got two similar profiles parallel to each other with same amount of corners and some spline curves in between connecting these two profiles from corner to corner. Loft feature works just fine as long as i dont select any guide curves. Can someone explain to me what i am doing wrong when it comes to guide curves?

Søren Stærk Dec 12, 2018 2:15 AM

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Hi Gencosman.

I used skecth 1 and 2 for direction 1.

Direction 2, RMB and select selection manager, so you will be able to select one line at the time in 3D sketch.

Guide curves as i experience it, should have their own sketch - but you can use the selection manager as a work around

Hope this helps

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guide_curves_test.SLDPRT.zip87.6 KB

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Richard Her Dec 11, 2018 9:13 AM
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I think you may be selecting your guide lines as "closed loop". I tried your file with "open loop" guide lines and was able to make the part. Hope this helps?
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- guide_curves_test2.SLDPRT.zip90.2 KB
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- Gencosman Sahin @ Richard Her on Dec 11, 2018 9:32 AM
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  Hey Richard,
  When i click on a guide curve, solidworks brings up the selection manager i click on the 2. symbol which is the open loop and click on the green check mark to confirm my selection so im pretty sure im selecting my guide curves as open loops. In the part you attached you didnt select every guide curve there is though, there are total of 12 curves there you got only 10 of them and that changes the shape of the top and bottom narrow edges shapes (at least thats what it looks like in the preview). When i try selecting the remaining two curves, i get "cannot knit sheets together" error.
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Maha Nadarasa Dec 11, 2018 9:20 AM
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I am not sure but it is my conclusion, if you are opting for shortest distance between two profile you do not need guide curve.
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- Gencosman Sahin @ Maha Nadarasa on Dec 11, 2018 9:36 AM
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  Hey Maha,
  I want to be able to shape the solid as i wish so im using splines with tangencies to give it a continuous shape rather than a sharp one created with lines.
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John Stoltzfus Dec 11, 2018 9:19 AM
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Gencosman Sahin

The most important part when it comes to lofts is to have each sketch have the same amount of sketch points, makes it a much smoother transition and yes like Richard Her mentions, guide curves should be open sketches
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- Gencosman Sahin @ John Stoltzfus on Dec 11, 2018 9:42 AM
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  Hey John,
  I just tried deleting every sketch point and construction line that i wasnt using with the loft feature but it didnt help and i double checked to make sure that im using open loops as my guide curves. I still cant get it to work while every guide curve is selected.
  
  Edit: Here you can see the two profiles, they are the same shape but different dimensions with same amount of sketch points.
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  - John Stoltzfus @ Gencosman Sahin on Dec 11, 2018 9:48 AM
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    I didn't have time to open up your model yet.. The only thing that I wanted to point out was - In some cases having different amounts of sketch points between the sketches will distort the model in the loft process...
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    - Gencosman Sahin @ John Stoltzfus on Dec 11, 2018 10:25 AM
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      Of course and since we are only writing to each other, i might seem talking in an aggressive way but its really the opposite, im just trying to learn more Thanks for taking the time to help
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Søren Stærk Dec 11, 2018 9:55 AM
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I got there using the boundary instead
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- Gencosman Sahin @ Søren Stærk on Dec 11, 2018 10:15 AM
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  Hey Soren,
  Could you post the part here? I dont know much about surfacing so i couldnt find how to use the guide curves with boundary surface feature.
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  - Richard Her @ Gencosman Sahin on Dec 11, 2018 11:32 AM
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    I wasn't able to create with guide curves, but I was able to make the part with a boundary surface also. I used all 12 guide lines this time. Here's the file.
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    guide_curves_test3.SLDPRT.zip121.7 KB
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    - Gencosman Sahin @ Richard Her on Dec 12, 2018 5:48 AM
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      Hey Richard,
      Your part is just fine too, like Soren's. I probably need to stop using loft and switch to surfacing features, they do seem like a simpler way to do it. Thanks a lot for your help
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  - Søren Stærk @ Gencosman Sahin on Dec 12, 2018 2:15 AM
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    Hi Gencosman.
    
    I used skecth 1 and 2 for direction 1.
    Direction 2, RMB and select selection manager, so you will be able to select one line at the time in 3D sketch.
    
    Guide curves as i experience it, should have their own sketch - but you can use the selection manager as a work around
    
    Hope this helps
    Attachments
    guide_curves_boundary-boss.SLDPRT.zip108.9 KB
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    - Gencosman Sahin @ Søren Stærk on Dec 12, 2018 5:41 AM
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      Hey Soren,
      Yeah this one look just right. Maybe i should stop trying to do it with loft then, boundary surfacing seems like an easier way to do it. Thanks a lot for your help.
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Steven Mills Dec 11, 2018 11:42 AM
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I can't open the file as your using a future version of SW. However one thing I noticed from the pictures, your trying to make a cavity within the loft? If so, have you considered doing two lofts? One for the overall shape, then a lofted cut for the cavity?

Also, it used to be that you had to make separate sketches for complicated lofts. One for each profile, and one for each guide curve. If you really want to control a loft feature it's still a good way to do it.
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- Gencosman Sahin @ Steven Mills on Dec 12, 2018 6:58 AM
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  Hey Steven,
  I'm not trying to create a cavity or anything like that. The picture you saw was an orthogonal shot of two different profiles (they are seperated from each other by a distance of 70cm iirc) i was trying to loft into each other.
  Both of those profiles had their own sketches. I didnt know that i had to use a different sketch for each different guide curve though, im gonna try to do it like that and get back to you on how it goes
  
  Edit: It didnt work sadly. I tried 12 different 3d sketches for my 12 different guide curves, im still getting that cannot knit sheets together error.
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  - John Stoltzfus @ Gencosman Sahin on Dec 12, 2018 6:50 AM
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    Gencosman Sahin
    didnt know that i had to use a different sketch for each different guide curve though,
    Another thing to add - If you're using Guide Curves, they must intersect with the Profile Sketches....
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    - Gencosman Sahin @ John Stoltzfus on Dec 12, 2018 6:53 AM
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      Ye i'm making sure of that John.
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Loft Feature - Guide curves

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