[Plugin] Volume Calculator2...

watkins

Dear TIG,

Do you think you might have time to look at your latest, fast version of the volume calculator? I am still using V1.8 as V2.1 seems to fail when challenged with one of my models.

Kind regards,
Bob

TIG

V2 was a quicker alternative way of accurately calculating volumes. v2 does it by 'slicing'...

Use v1 for more complex shapes (slow)
or use v2 for simpler shapes (quicker)

see which suits you best...

I currently don't have time to sort out v2 - if anyone else wants to tweak it, please feel free...

.

watkins

Dear TIG,

Okay, I will do that. Thanks for the response.

Kind regards,
Bob

free agent

is there any way to force a volume, i have a bottle design here and the client needs it to be 500ml and wants to know what the resulting dimensions would be.

AdamB

@unknownuser said:

is there any way to force a volume, i have a bottle design here and the client needs it to be 500ml and wants to know what the resulting dimensions would be.

If you know the current volume with the current dimensions, then you'll need to scale the current design by:

3√(targetvolume / currentvolume)

Adam

free agent

see a good reason to have payed attension in math class... i'll try

thomthom

@unknownuser said:

see a good reason to have payed attension in math class... i'll try

Did you ever say: "I'll naver have use of that!"..?

AdamB

BTW Thats "cube root" not "3 times squareroot"

Perhaps TIG could be persuaded to add a function to Volume Calc that does this since I can see it must be pretty common to be wanting to get to a target volume.

Now if three men take four days to dig.. nevermind..

Adam

watkins

Dear Adamm & TIG,

Could the volume calculator be updated so that the newer, faster script doesn't fall over with multiple internal volumes? I am currently using V1.8 as that seems to work well for complicated shapes, but it does take a long time when the precision goes up. Further, while easily calculated by hand (once one knows the volume), could an editable drop-down list of densities be added so that the script works out the mass as an option. Typical densities would be for concrete, steel, wood, water, sand etc.

Another option would be to assign materials properties to components (is this possible?), and then to get the script to work on an assembly (such as a wooden cabinet), treating each component separately (volume and mass) returning a table (spreadsheet) of volumes and masses with the total mass. This could be useful in assessing loading, lifting and shipping requirements. The calculations for C of G are very similar to those for volume (slicing the model), so that is yet another option, as is moments of inertia.

I'm sure you are both very busy, but I offer these few thoughts for consideration.

Regards,
Bob

AdamB

First off, "Volume Calculator" is TIG's baby not mine!

The analytic method for Volume calc (the fast one) will not give the right answer if you have "open geometry". You can find all open edges by running a script like this (doesn't recurse into groups/components):

def findleaks(ents = Sketchup.active_model.entities)

	for ent in ents 
		next unless ent.kind_of? Sketchup;;Edge
		
		if ent.faces.length == 1
			Sketchup.active_model.selection.add ent
		end
	end
end

The problem is there isn't a real simple way of automatically closing those "leaks".

Adam

free agent

woohoo it worked thanx adamB

TIG

I'd better jump in here...

I made the early versions of Volume calculate by slicing the selected component or group into pieces and totting up the face-cut areas - like crude 'calculus'... It had levels of accuracy as it takes a while to slice and calculate a lot of faces. Often simple shapes return reasonably accurate volumes with few slices...

Adam suggested a 'clever' way of calculating the volume - it has the advantage of being very fast and accurate but is prone to falling over it the faces aren't complete etc...

That's why there are two versions out there.

I would like to fix the fast version much as you ask. It could also include density and CofG etc: however, I am very busy on other things - I will publish something as soon as I can... but no promises...

If anyone else would like to adopt my 'Volume' code and re-do it please feel free [I did something similar with Mirror.rb a while back - completely rewriting the method, but still gave Frank Wiesner the initial credit for having the original ideas up to 2.5 - now on 3.1 ?]...
.

watkins

Dear TIG and Adam,

Thank you for taking my request/suggestions seriously.

Regards to you both.

Bob

watkins

Dear TIG,

Do you think you might find a moment to take a look at your volume calculator. As I wrote before, the 'faster' version falls over when applied to a shape with cavities. A faster, working version would be good as then one could use the higher precision without the time overhead.

Other improvements might include:

Mass calculation (volume x density), with a editable drop down menu of typical densities (glass, concrete, soil, sand, water, steel, plastic etc)
Centre of Gravity
Moments of inertia

Kind regards,
Bob

piyono

Sorry to go OT, but I can't seem to get Sketchup 7.1.4871 to recognize the volume plugins. I've dropped them into the /Plugins folder with the rest of my plugins, all the rest of which work fine.

Any ideas?

Piyono

TIG

@unknownuser said:

Sorry to go OT, but I can't seem to get Sketchup 7.1.4871 to recognize the volume plugins. I've dropped them into the /Plugins folder with the rest of my plugins, all the rest of which work fine.

Any ideas?

Piyono

It's a right-click context-menu item only - available if you have a group or component-instance selected... There's no menu item - if that's your point ?

piyono

@tig said:

It's a right-click context-menu item only - available if you have a group or component-instance selected... There's no menu item - if that's your point ?

Ahh... I see.
I was selecting primitive volumes, not groups or components.

Thanks!

ken

TIG

Well I haven’t used the plugin “Volume” for sometime and not sure when this problem started to occur. Right now, VolumeCalucator2.1, 2 or 1.7 or 1.8, all the versions I have, the context menu stays grayed out. Not sure what I have added to make this plugin’s context menu not functional.

Just passing this on to you, don’t expect you to go back and figure out what is wrong. I have added and removed the required “#” symbols to add the “Volume” selection to the plugin menu and removed the grayed out selection from the context menu.

Most of my work involves working with designs that are located underwater. So if you ever do look at this program again, besides all the choices in volumes, it would be nice to have two more choices, buoyancy in saltwater or fresh water.

Again thanks so much for the original plugin.

Ken

ken

TIG

Thanks for your quick reply.

Ken

TIG

Recent updates of SUp seem to have led to graying-out of context-menu items that only a restart and early try to use them fixes... The context-menu items can usually still be accessed via the end of the main Edit menu...
Something to do with how many clicks you do before it breaks - hopefully a future SUp update will fix this...