Hi,
I'm trying to build a 3d part which resembles a thin membrane with an approximate elliptical surface (xy plane) and with varying thickness in the z direction. The membrane dimensions are approx 1.5mm x 2.5mm for the minor and major axis of the surface and the thickness varies from 1um to about 20um. I am using an imported image of a contour map and have tried tracing around the edge with a spline, extruding this over a very small thickness and then using freeform to place control curve lines across the membrane surface, place control points and adjust each of them to the required height in the z direction. I have encountered a few problems mainly I think because of the disparity in dimensions and very thin adjustments using the freeform tool.
I suppose all I'm looking for is some advice on whether I'm going about this the right way. I'm considering scaling up the variation in the z-direction initially (can rescale it later via separate modelling software) and using the same technique.
However I'm wondering if anyone has made a similar structure before or has better ideas of how to go about this.
Any help is most welcome.
Thank you in advance
David Mackie
Ultrasound Engineering
PhD Student
If you are using surfacing, I would consider using the deform (curve-to-curve) option in place of the freeform tool. Then I would either thicken the surface or shell it out if possible.
If possible and depending on the geometry, I maybe tempted to model a membrane as sheetmetal part using a forming tool for the complex geometry, or as a shelled part using the indent feature (see here). Can you post an image?