[Plugin] Slicer v4.3 20110619
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In our work, we often deal with terrains modeled as surfaces, not volumes, often very irregular. Making a volume out of them is sometimes quite hard, even with Joint Push-Pull.
Is there a "slicer" that can make slices from a surface ? Slices would then be only segments.
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To give a meshed surface a volume requires a bit of planning...
You select all of the perimeter edges.
Then use my tool ExtrudeEdgesByVector to extrude all of these edges vertically downwards (-ve Z / blue) far neyond the lowest one.
Check that the faces are 'outwards'.
Leave the extrusion in its group for now.
Edit the group and draw a large flat rectangular plane facing down [reverse if necessay] located below the geometry, but so that it intersects with ALL of these new vertical faces.
Select All inside the group and 'Intersect with Selected'.
Erase the unwanted bits of the rectangle and change your view so you can easily 'select by fence' the bits of the vertical faces below it - delete them.
Close the group-edit and select all of the mesh and Edit-Copy.
Edit the group again and Edit>PasteInPlace
Now you have a 3D volume with the top as a mesh...
Move it to one side or copy the group and paste it into an empty model - and you can Volume or Slice, or whatever you need to do...If you have two meshes - e.g. existing and proposed land surfaces - you can do a 'cut and fill' volume etc by intersecting them together and making a groups of what's left - there's a tutorial on that somewhere...
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Thanks TIG that works a treat.
i am sure i have seen a slicer tutorial before where it adds the slots half way up and half way down, is there a way of doing that with 3.1?i slice in the x and then sllice in the y and lay the sections out flat, but if there was a way of adding the midway slots that would be a huge advantage
let me know cheers ash
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cool, when's it gonna be ready to unleash on us?
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Tig, I have tried your method to give a volume to a mesh surface. Not bad. But not it, for us.
Having to do all these extrusion just kills the gain. (btw I used the term terrain where I should have used cliff and hill sides.)
What we need is to replace our manual process of generating slice from the meshes, group&number them, and offset to get rib (& face) for cnc.
Or maybe just a rb to make numbered groups of our slice lines and then flattened copies ? -
mariocha - I don't fully follow you...
To work out Volumes there are Volume Tools - Slicer is a different thing ? -
There is a paid script SliceModeller that I unwittingly helped develop !
That adds slots to the slices... Slicerv4 might do that too...
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Sorry, I meant
Slicer only works on volumes, so you suggested to make volumes out of our meshes (with ExtrudeEdgesBy Vector).
We would like to automate mesh slicing to rib.
(giving an offset value to make the face)
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Wouldn't it be quicker to make the 'curtain' and then use JointPushPull on it to give it a Volume then Slice it ?
Or are you looking for a Slice at Nodes option ?
Can you give a before and after example, with steps so I can understand your issues better...
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Indeed we tried with JPP. And we use it on simple meshes before Slicer. But often the mesh is too complicated, with acute angles, JPP results in a mess then. So an offset has to be done after the slicing.
But I realise that the overlaps that Offset often do are going to be a problem that will need manual work anyway.
So we only need the part of the script that generates the slices, numbers and flattens them, like #16.
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So if I understand correctly, you want a version of Slicer that can make slices through a '2D-mesh' - a 'curtain' of faces [that have no 3D values in plan - or the equivalent 'other' dimension] - and then represent these as group of lines forming 2D slices laid out on plan. I assume that you don't want any 'thickness' to these 'slices' as they are initially 'lines' anyway ?
Are these always in plan ?
If so there already is myContourMaker?I see you seem to 'make faces' of the results - this could be added as an auto-offset by a desired distance of the lines closed into a face...
What is the exact use of these later on ? CNC work ?
Is this what you want ?
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Yes Sir TIG, you got it right.
But these overlaps Offset creates (when some lines are shorter than the offset distance, I think) are going to be impossible to handle automatically, no? -
Watch this space...
Do you want to always cut in Z - it's easier that if I have to make XYZ versions ??? -
Like this
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So the 'ribs' are vertical.
How do you determine there rotation about the Z axis ?
By axis X/Y or by Node angle bisector etc ?
It is easy enough to make the closing edges 'horizontal'...
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Great.
My sections are always standing up. But at any angle on xy plane.
Oh, and the top and bottom level have to stay the same if a face is created. Offset tends to change these if the initial top or bottom lines are slanted, as you know. -
If you made a curve along the front edge then the ribs could be angled to match the angle-bisector to each pair of edges at a node, or square at the ends ?
What would the typical 'scale' of this be - i.e. rib depth and rib spacing etc...
Do these ribs project into the face, or out from it ? -
A curve along the front edges ? Ha! on the floor, you mean? It would have to be a bezier, I guess.
Ribs are a few inches (4") behind the faces.
Typical heights are 5' to 20', rib with of 10" -
You can make a 'curve' from any selection of edges that are continuous - use 'weld.rb'.
You could set this curve in 4" from the face and then a rib 10" wide inwards from that.
Centers would then be the curve's nodes ?
Height matches the face's height where it is 'cut'.
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Yes that is just right.
(I confused "curve" (arc) with "curve" (polyline))
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