Yes, I only need the exterior mold (shape) of the plane, with very few internal (structural) elements. It will be used (at 1/12th scale) for planning the manufacturing stations (sizes and locations) in the facility. Once that is firmed up, I have a partial full scale detailed version of the facility that I will modify and use.

I went to a scaled version because it is easier to navigate and change than at full scale, even if the full scale planning model was low-poly. There is very little detail in the scaled version, and a full scale version would entice me to add details.

I will try "polyreduce".

As for the footprint, I cannot figure how to set my geo to the equator at noon (time I figured). But you got me thinking about scaling the airplane model down flat i.e: 100% scale down the blue axis. Then I'll intersect it on a flat plane (no pun intended ) and trace that outline.

I'll get back to you on both.

========================================

Well, scaling on blue to "flat" did not quite work. First, "scale" only allows a "-.11" scale factor so I tried ".01". It was not flat enough, even doing it twice. Also my dwg was too complex. Scrap that.

Still can't see how to set my Geo to the equator, so I can trace the shadow.

However, since I used to draw boats and calculate the heeled waterline, I tried something like that. I made a flat plane group, and successively moved it up and intersected the plane at various "wide" points on the airplane to get a close approximation of the outermost footprint, plus a myriad of extra lines from the airplanes internal structures that I could not turn off. Spent a lot of time deleting those lines, then hit the old SU 6 problem of non-intersected crossing lines, coupled with Intersects' bad habit of not keeping lines on face as well as omitting a lot of intersecting lines. A LOT of cleanup to do before I can get a cohesive footprint.

Back later....

==================================

Frustrated!!!!!!

I cleaned up the outline, but it will not form a face within the outline. Many lines are just off the z=00000 level, so that the face won't form. Then as I was replacing 2 short lines with one, SU crashed.
Fortunately, SU autosaved just a few minutes prior so I lost almost nothing.

Back on this tomorrow, as I gotta pick up my "warden" at the subway.

2 part question

1st part....My big airplane project. I am creating a rough floor plan and building shell of the manufacturing facility at 1/12th scale. I now need a 1/12th scale model of my big airplane, but I don't need most of the detail in the scaled model (separate drawing).

Scaling down is not the problem. How do I create a scaled model with significantly less entity detail?

If I just scale it down then I will end up with an overly complex model with a lot of extremely small entities, which we all know, SU does not handle very well. I have lots of non-flat sections, that I don't care if they look chunky after the scale down.

2nd part....I need a footprint drawing of the airplane. This is simply a directly overhead shadow that I can outline. I turned on "shadows" but I cannot see how to put the sun directly overhead. The sun angle default distorts the footprint significantly in places.

Thanks in advance...

Sorry for the late reply guys and thanks.

I really don't want to redefine the L/R scroll as now I use it in other apps. I tried at first and the codes will work in SU but nowhere else.

Too bad Logitech can't develop a mouse with an app sensitive button redefinition. Logitech has a bad habit of messing with success and not providing upgrades with the ability to detect what you have now before replacing software (assuming you are upgrading an old Logitech mouse). This is my 4th Logitech mouse and I've had to relearn (and redefine) every one of them. My new MX-600 mouse has 11 re-definable buttons, which I have set as best I can to come near my old MX-70 with 10 buttons. The only major difference is the MX-70 did not have a side scroll wheel function.

Too bad SU does not provide for advanced mice button settings also. Then you can redefine any button input to perform a specific SU function, without having to redefine the mouse itself.

Anyway, specifically, Gai; my new Logitech "Setpoint" s/w does not have a "Generic Mouse" setting.

Likewise Dylan, there is no "middle-click" function. Currently my scroll wheel depress function is set to "O" to initiate the orbit tool, akin to what my old MX-70 did.

The critical difference here is the old MX-70 initiated and maintained the orbit tool while the wheel was depressed, and released the orbit tool back to the tool you were using when the wheel was released, with an implied "exit". The new MX-600 calls the orbit tool when the wheel is depressed, and you need to rt-click to select "exit" to release it. Pressing the wheel does not release the orbit tool. And in SU there is no shortcut key for the orbit tool "exit" function. It HAS to be clicked on.
I'm just not used to doing it that way after 2 1/2 years of ingrained autonomic function.

And Mitcorb, I will try that route. Thanks for the suggestion.

A few days ago my trusty mouse died in a spectacular fashion. It was a 5 year old wireless Logitech MX-70 with 8 buttons. First the cursor took on a life of its own, then the buttons went haywire, then it died, cursor dead center of the screen. I really liked it, and used almost all the buttons.

I assumed the way it operated in SU was normal, because I did nothing special with it or SU when I installed SU the very first time 2+ years ago, nor since. When I depressed the scroll wheel, SU would assume the orbit tool, till I released the wheel. Spinning the wheel zoomed, and moving left/right panned. With a finger on CTRL or SHIFT it would rotate or spin. This really made navigation super simple and fast.

I spent a day looking for a replacement, finally settling on a new USB KB/Mouse combo from Costco. The KB & Mouse combo cost less than a similar mouse alone elsewhere. The mouse is a USB Laser Logitech MX-600 which has most of the buttons the old one had. It does NOT behave like the old one in one very important area.

At first the scroll wheel would only zoom. Pressing the wheel did nothing. So I programmed the wheel to "O" (orbit tool) when pressed. However, it now only selects the orbit tool, where the old mouse engaged the orbit tool only while pressed. Plus I need to press the left mouse key to actually orbit, while the old mouse would orbit while just holding down the wheel and moving the mouse. As a result, a change of view is now a multi-step function, not seamless like the old mouse.

This also affects the move tool in a very similar fashion. I cannot drag an object past the edge of screen. It is now very difficult to move an object to a precise position as the pan/orbit functions are disassociated from the move tool.

Aside from having to relearn how to navigate in SU-6, I was wondering if there may be a better keystroke to reprogram the mouse wheel with, and better yet, is there any way I can make SU respond to the side-scroll wheel function? The side-scroll works in a narrow window, such as the layers window, but not in the drawing area.

Got it, thanks, TIG.

I'll Try it on Wed as I gotta take the Mrs out for a quick dinner (she was too lazy to cook) and tomorrow I am out most of the day.

That's better Wo3Dan, I will keep it in mind.

But, TIG's fillet tool looks more like what I want, but hey TIG!! Where's it at?

@wo3dan said:

The arc you just made is tangent but not yet the right size.
The nice thing is you can adjust its radius in entity info, still letting it stay tangent to both edges.
Wo3Dan

Yes, that is a neat way to lay down a tangential arc of a defined radius, without guides or inference points. However, it is too many tool changes, clicks and a keyboard when I have a few dozen to do at one time.

@thomthom said:

And quarter-circle snap would be nice.

Agree.

But better yet, arcs at a defined radius (and segments) between 2 selected intersecting lines and a tangential arc forms.

@cmd said:

jgb,

yes... it looks like the Arc tool does not analyze the edges when you are going from Construction Point to Construction Point .... or when creating edge tick marks (my personal habit)

jgb... perhaps line segments or construction LINES instead of POINTS may help in your work.

CMD

Yes, construction LINES do work, Thanks. I too tried tick marks and I was surprised they do not work when a crossed line intersection does work. But ticks are work to create, as you have to measure where they go first, so it's a double step, unless you need the tick to make a line break or it is needed after you delete guides.

I noticed that with only a single guide line, I sometimes do not get the magenta cue at 45 deg, unless I trace the arc tool from the guide line intersection to the apex and then to its' diagonal inference. And even that does not work when you do a second arc on the same pair of lines.

So, lines work, points don't. that is an easy workaround, and Pipe-along-path happily makes seamless joins. But, as Thomthom said, it would be nice if the arc tool was consistent with construction points as are the other tools.

Nice explanation Gai, but sadly does not address my problem.

First off I have dozens to do in this model (heavy cable electrical runs), almost all at the same symmetrical arc radius of 3 inches, so drawing "any" arc then scaling it back is not practical. That's way more fiddly work than cleaning up the join lines after the P-A-P runs.

The problem is that I do not get even a magenta 45 deg line if I start from a 3 inch guide point on 1 or both lines. I only get it from a midpoint or intersection or from any unmarked point on the line(s).

And I am testing every statement here as I write.

I have 2 lines perp to each other on the blue/red axis, each about 100 inches long, but not equal.
From midpoint to midpoint I get the 2 cyan tangent cues.
From any point on 1 line to the magenta inference on the other I get a magenta tangent cue.

But if I make a guide point on 1 line at say 30 in, I do NOT get a magenta inference. And if I click on the midpoint on the second line, I only get the cyan tangent cue tangent to the midpoint line only, but NOT the tangent to the guide pointed line.

2 guide points at any equal or different distances and I get NO cues for tangent at all.

I also played with a rect. tool created face, and got very similar results. 2 guide points = no tangent cue.

Me thinks there may be a bug in SU here (don't tell Gully ) Again, this is SU V6.

In order to reduce my labor in most of these arc generations, and considering almost all my arcs are same size and between 2 perp. lines, I create 1 arc as best I can, and copy it to other intersections oriented in the same plane (flipping as required) and repeat the same for the other 2 orientations. Then I clean up all the corners, select the whole line, P-A-P and finally soften/smooth each join.

Having the arc tool perform with proper tangent cues from a single guide point would reduce that workload considerably.

When I have a high-poly repetitive item that is essentially for final show purposes, like a tree, I make a very low poly flat representative component, with the "always face camera" attribute. Then I put the high poly trees on their own layer, and the low poly trees on their own layer.

When working on and navigating the model I turn on only the low poly layer. (if I really need it)

When I have a scene that needs to be viewed in detail or printed, I switch layers.

I use the arc tool a lot, in conjunction with pipe-along-path.

However there seems to be either an inconsistency or, I'm doing something wrong.

When I make an arc between two joined lines, usually at 90 deg, I use the tape tool to create guide points on both lines equidistant from the apex in order to form a smooth curved join. Then with the arc tool, I will create an arc between the 2 guides and (try to) form a tangential arc. Then I delete the 2 line stubs and face formed by that arc and run P-A-P on the formed line.

Here's the problem. Sometimes, maybe 1 in 20 tries, the arc tool will show a magenta tangential arc. Most times it will not. When it does not, P-A-P will leave a join line between the curved and straight "pipes" which have to be softened and smoothed.

When the magenta line does not appear, the arc tool seems to first snap (on edge) at a point that causes an excess bulge, and is not tangential. I then have to eye the curve to what seems tangential to me, and that always leaves a join line in the pipe.

It does not matter if I do the arc on a temp face at the apex, or just the 2 lines alone. But I do seem to get a better quality first snap on lines that are not perpendicular.

The only times I can get a consistent tangential snap is when I do the arc between one or both of the mid-points of each line, which is no use if the line is 10 feet long and I want a 3 inch arc.

I get the tangential snap (but tangent to only 1 line) if I do NOT use guide points to place the arc. If I use guide points, I don't even get the snap at 45 deg.

Still on V6.4.112

@dolphus said:

My latest daydream a futuristic freight locomotive still under development

Neat models. I'm not into trains, but I am into airplanes. A minor critique of your freight loco is it's aerodynamic shape at the front end.

Depending on its speed, say anywhere over 90 mph, the rounded nose will create a lift and potentially unload the front bogies enough to be a problem. This lift is more from the ram air effect on the lower part of the nose and not the winglike lift from over the top. My suggestion is to drop the leading edge down closer to the track, more like the loco in your first model in this topic.

Also, what practical purpose is the very aero shape on a freight loco? It won't offer enough anti-drag to pay for its complexity to build considering the amount of aero drag on common freight rolling stock.
I can see such shaping on fast passenger trains, not lumbering freighters.

Sexy shape though.....

Does anyone know of a script; or if not; could someone please write a script to do this?

From the vertex of 2 lines joined in space, draw a tangential arc at a specified distance from the vertex, then delete the resultant stubs at the vertex. Length of lines and contained angle should not matter. The arc ends should be welded to the line ends creating a 1 line object.

In operation, user selects 2 joined lines,
selects pluggin tool/key, (preferably Right Click)
dialog or VCB asks for arc distance from vertex,
-or- mouse click on 1 line at arc point,
pluggin draws tangential arc,
deletes stub lines at vertex,
and then welds ends.

I'm doing cable harness's with dozens of wires and multiple bends, so I need to do hundreds of these. Manually each bend now takes 10 clicks. I then use Pipe-along-path to create each wire, or wire bundle.

Thanks

But does he wear them??

See? This one is real and not "imagined".
So, how do I collect my Tee Shirt???

Please see this topic for the details of what led up to this bug report.

http://groups.google.com/group/sketchupsuggestions/browse_thread/thread/85ebdb51af3ad325?hl=en

In essence the following has been determined to be a bug in SU6 and SU7;

When using Context [RightClick Zoom Extents] to zoom onto a selected object, the following was noted;

Selecting a top group and [Rt.Clk Zoom Extents] will zoom onto the object as expected.

If [View][Component Edit][Hide Rest of Model] is set to OFF/unticked (ON layers are ghosted during edit) [rt.clk zoom ext.] will zoom onto selected sub elements as expected.

If [View][Component Edit][Hide Rest of Model] is set to ON/ticked, (ON layers are invisible during edit) it
does NOT zoom on sub elements. It will zoom onto the global origin beyond the view of the selected object.

Wo3Dan confirmed this by finding;

Even when ALL geometry is on layer0 the 'Zoom Extents' does not seem to work on selections within any editing context in groups and/or components when 'Fade rest of model' is checked. The result is always the current global origin in the middle of the screen.

Joel G Berson (jgb)

@wacov said:

Don't see why no-one else has replied I'd be happy to help, I've got good general knowledge of SP and I know some workarounds for problems; I don't have a huge amount of spare time but this is something I'm interested in; Smaller mini-tutorials for more specific/advanced stuff is what I'd like to do.

My guess is that nobody really wants to devote the effort. Like I said, it is not a trivial task.
As for advanced stuff mini's, we need to document the fundementals first. Take Curbs work and flesh out some more details on the basic joints and settings. Then carry on where he left off with the remaining joints. At that point we can get into advanced stuff like linking different types of joints and how-to's on some of the fancy stuff we've all seen, but can't figure out how to do.

@shareck said:

ok. i've seen models on the warehouse that have a motor with reverse function controlled by a single controller. |Still i cant figure out how to make such a motor. Please. Prepare a tutorial for me

Best to repost this as its' own topic. The how-to you get will form part of a tutorial, if it ever gets going.

(Transfered from "How can we help out?" topic in
"http://groups.google.com/group/sketchyphysics/"
on Chris Phillips recommendation.) jgb

There have been several attempts at properly documenting SP. So far
the incomplete but best effort is by Curbs. I tried, but Curbs
outclassed me by a long shot, so we sorta joined forces, till I had to
abandon my efforts due to other commitments, and my inability to wrap
my head around some fundamentals of SP. (That's about me, not SP.)

So, what I'm saying here is, don't underestimate the complexity of
documenting SP. It is a great program with great possibilities, but
it IS complex. I would suggest setting up a specific SP tutorial
forum strictly for collaboration, continuity, and division of labor.
One person cannot do it all, unless it is a full time endeavor and that
person knows SP inside out. Chris can only help so much, as coding is
his forte, not tech writing, by his own admission. That is fair, as
some are great coders, and some are great tech writers, and it is very
rare both are one person.

I can help as well. My main experienced strength is project
planning. If a bunch of you that want to participate in a thorough
tutorial covering all that SP can do, then let's meet here and decide
on a format (See Curbs tutorial as a prime guide) and define the
various SP tools and processes at play, then divvy up the work.

This is NOT a trivial task, and it will take weeks if not a few months
of committed coordinated work and testing/proof reading.

It also means using a single forum as the Tutorial meeting room, and
not opening new threads to ask Chris a question. We all need to be
"on the same page" so to speak. And I think Chris should be coding
not dancing between forums on this matter.

Also, as has happened before, this will not be an ad-hoc forum where
non-tutorial questions are answered. They tend to hi-jack a forum
once people see all the "experts" congregating.

So let those that are interested reply here, and we will see where it
goes.

jgb