Reduce circle facets on imported DWG
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I'm working on a stand design & have just discovered that the modular system I intend to use is already uploaded to the warehouse - Excellent, I thought. That will save a great deal of work and I'm very grateful. I believe the files have been imported from AutoCAD (its 'bematrix' for anyone who wants to take a look). The pieces comprise metal profiles with many holes punched through... many, many holes! I've downloaded all the files but have discovered that all the holes are set at a default of 24 sides! They are not actually punched through the metal, but simply drawn on - probably OK for my purposes - but they are drawn on both sides of the 'hole'. This multiplies up to over 18000 entities in one vertical profile!
As the pieces have been imported, all these circles are not instances of one component circle.
You know what I'm going to ask...is there any way to reduce these facets? In some cases the 'holes' are no more than 6mm diameter, will hardly be visible & a hexagon would do just fine.
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Select them all and use my tool that mimics what can be done in Entity Info on a selection of arcs/circles...
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?p=158903#p158903 -
Fiona,
A few thoughts for you...
Do you actually need the holes at all ???
There are no prizes for over modelling / over detailing thats not really required.
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I guess you are probably more interested in the design of your actual stand and its contents than the framework that makes up the stand (if that makes sense).
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In SketchUp, try and keep the number of edges in your models down as much as possible.
This greatly increases performance / speed of your models.
Also, the inferencing engine (automatic snapping) in SU sometimes gets confused when it has lots of edges to choose from.
This framework has many holes per member and the number of edges in your model could go up wildly - possibly for little real benefit in your particular case.
If I were you, I wouldn't model the holes at all.
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Have you seen Profile Builder ??? Brilliant plug-in (worth every penny):
http://www.smustard.com/script/ProfileBuilderhttp://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=323&t=44237&hilit=profile+builder
I think you would find this plug-in extremely useful for your task.
It would be VERY FAST and SIMPLE to create the framework of your stand using Profile Builder.
A free version now exists so you can get the idea how it works / see if you like the plug-in.
You'd need the Pro version to define your own Profiles but its very easy to create them.
I guess this modular system maybe has 6 - 10 different profiles ??? eg "H" member sections, "L" sections, corner mouldings etc
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You could even use the Profiles of the members you've already downloaded (if u think they are drawn accurately) or you could create your own from scratch if you have the info for them - its very straightforward.
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Hope this helpsHoward L'
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TIG - thanks, I'll try your arc curve tool - I think that will do the job. I also have access to the original ACAD files now so I tried importing them to SU myself (after setting the number of circle facets to 12)... but ended up with 40 facets!
Howard - absolutely! I really don't need to see all the 6mm diameter holes at all. I will need to show the many 30mm holes as they're significant to the design of the system. I haven't looked at profile builder before (I don't do that many modular stand designs) but it does look interesting & a useful addition, so I'll try that out too.
So, looks like I have several options. I don't actually mind if I have to re-built the required profiles from scratch - SU makes it so much easier tha ACAD.
Thanks for the advice.
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PS. just watched Profile Builder demo... how did I miss this one!?
Of course, now I'll just have to 'play' SU all afternoon instead of cooking/gardening/other domestic stuff... what a shame!
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Irrespective of circle's setting in the CAD file it imports into the SKP file with 24 segments.
How about working in the CAD file, making a block that's a cross of two 6mm lines, and filtering a find for all 3mm radius Circles and placing that Block at the centers and erasing the circles.
Save and re-import into the SKP ?
This lisp routine will automatically do it for you http://caddsoftwares.com/convert-muliple-circles-to-block-2/40
Then edit the circle block in place and make it a cross - all 3mm radius circles are them crosses etc... -
Thanks for the extra help TIG. Two things... I never did quite get to grips with AutoLisp although I used ACAD for a long time, secondly 'used' is the key word! Since getting into SU I've completly dropped my ACAD programme (out of date, won't run on windows 7 & just too expensive to upgrade). I've been getting on very well just importing existing DWGs into SU.
I did load your arc curve set segments tool but couldn't seem to access it (I had it in the 'additional plugins folder' initially but have now loaded it directly into the SU Plugins folder). I assumed I'd see some new info. in the 'entity info' window. Could you point me in the right direction, please?
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You need to read the tool's guidance...
Put the .rb file in the Plugins folder and restart Sketchup.
If you have the latest version of the script [from 20120322] - from here http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?p=158903#p158903 - there is a Plugins menu item called 'Change Arc Segments', a dialog asks for the number of segments...
All editable preselected arcs/circles change to suit that setting...To select all active circles with a certain radius you can use use something like this copy/pasted+<enter> in the Ruby Console...
m=Sketchup.active_model;s=m.selection;s.clear;m.active_entities.each{|e|s.add(e) if e.is_a?(Sketchup;;Edge) && e.curve && e.curve.is_a?(Sketchup;;ArcCurve) && e.curve.radius.to_l==3.mm}you can change the "3.mm" to any radius needed, or even the == to say <= so 2mm radius circles are also included...
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Got it now! Thanks so much
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