I have been working on my helmet a while now, I got advice from others on this forum to do surface modeling instead of a lot of extruded cuts. It looks good, but all I need it to cut a few things out. I made a closed figure on a plane adjacent to the front plane, but all of my "cut" options are greyed out. Could someone help me and explain what they did?
You need to convert the surface into solid body using the knit surface option (and selecting "try to form solid"). Then only you would get the cut options. You can also try the trim tool in the surfacing though.
Looked quickly at your model and there is some gaps which is not allowing it become solid while doing knit.
So I would just knit all of the bodies to each adjacent one?
Ian,
Yes, but, as Deepak noted, if there are gaps left between faces, you can't make a solid out of it. You want to build your surfaces such that they meet nicely at the edges. That usually means using the edges of existing surfaces to define the surfaces as you add them, or making the surfaces larger and using the Mutual Trim to get rid of the excess.
Jerry S.
So, I knitted all of the surfaces into one, but I didn't choose, "Try to form solid" because it was grayed out, like the extruded cut. I also tried the "Thicken" feature, but I get the error "Unable to thicken". I need this to be fixed in a week, because that is when my assignment for my class is due.
You can also start out with a solid block and cut away what you don't want using surfaces.
http://home.pct.edu/~jmather/content/DSG322/SolidWorks_surface_tutorials.htm
Ian,
You need to clean up your original surfaces to get rid of any gaps (that's why "Try to form solid" is not available) and keep the transitions between surfaces better. Use Evaluate/Curvature to look for areas with a small radius of curvature. The thickness of your wall will be limited by the smallest radius of curvature. Also use Evaluate/Check to find the smallest radius of curvature.
Jerry S.
You need to convert the surface into solid body using the knit surface option (and selecting "try to form solid"). Then only you would get the cut options. You can also try the trim tool in the surfacing though.
Looked quickly at your model and there is some gaps which is not allowing it become solid while doing knit.