Well Mr.JQL that's what I did. I used the offset tool from "tools on surface" to offset the curve.

However that the offset curve is not 100% in the same plane as the surface is not really a big problem. It's tolerable. The main problem is that the orientation of all the "array copied" elements is not the same as the underlying curved surface/planes because it's a very tediouse task to rotate them manually in the same plane as the underlying surface/plane.

Which plugins/methodes do you use to array objects along a 3d path?

Good morning pilou and thanks for you input (it doesn't really answer my questions though – or I'm just to incapable to get how it does answer my questions )

Well, I'm designing (if I may call it like that) a hyperbolic paraboloid tensile structure (large 20m² tent) where the fabric (pvc coated polyester) should be attached at each end to a looped tube (maybe bamboo) through eyelets and spiral laced rope.

Spiral lacing through eyelets seems easy and cheap regarding manufacturing and construction but eyelets in fabric can not take large shear forces from tension and wind loads I guess.

hyperbolic paraboloid: https://www.google.at/search?q=hyperbolisches+Paraboloid%26amp;safe=off%26amp;source=lnms%26amp;tbm=isch%26amp;sa=X%26amp;ved=0ahUKEwi2qdzsmYLQAhWCHxoKHcSQCrIQ_AUICCgB%26amp;biw=1280%26amp;bih=580#safe=off%26amp;tbm=isch%26amp;q=hyperbolisches+paraboloid+architektur%26amp;imgdii=lDIjfvyT-fGzLM%3A%3BlDIjfvyT-fGzLM%3A%3BtQ1k-cYP-NDuKM%3A%26amp;imgrc=lDIjfvyT-fGzLM%3A

So much for that.

Well, on your curved surface you place each of the holes on an edge between two not coplanar surfaces, that's not the case with my curved surface – and despite being interesting consideration it doesn't has much today with my question.

So I'm still wondering with which tools/methods I can make proper offsets on curved surfaces and more important how can I make array copies on a curved 3d path with having control of orientation of the copied groups? In my case I want the array copied groups to be oriented to my curved surface - which the don't and I don't know any better than to rotate them manually after having array copied them - which sucks ass.

Hi sketchucation,

I'd like to offset the "border edge curve" on a shell structure to use it as a path to generate holes on the path which should be evenly spaced from each other by a distance of 100mm.

How do I do that clean and efficiently?

• My first approach was to use the "tools on surface" plugin to offset the border edge curve. However the generated curve is not aligned 100% to the curved surface. According to the manual of "tools on surface" there is no mathematical perfect solution for an offset on a curved surface and the curve generated by tools on surface is an approximation.

However I'd prefer an offset curve which lies neatly on the surface. Is there a way to generate an offset curve other than to draw it step by step by hand?

• The next step is that I'd like to use the curve as path to copy an array of circles along the path to use them to punch holes in the surface. I discovered the plug in "path copy" where I can set the spacing for groups copied along the path which workes fine. The problem is the orientation of the copied circles, the are all oriented to the xyz axes but I'd like them to be oriented to the surface of my shell structure.

If someone can give me tips to efficiently achieve my goal here I'd highly appreciate it!

holes along path.skp

@dave r said:

... I think I would have done it a little differently and would have left the parts as discrete components.

...which obviously is the straight forward way to go. Why the hell? was I doing it the "interesting way" I did it, is what I am asking me now. Well after all, I got some experience with SolidSolver and Outer Shell.

Many thanks Dave! (...what would I do without this forum?)

That was the problem, after fixing it I could succesfully create a solid of the floor and trim it against a cuboid to create a negative of the bottom.

How did you actually find that error? Do you have a certain approach for cheking? I mean there are many, many edges in the modell and my impression the error could be anywhere.

No I don't have the intention to 3D print the model. I just have some "container-home-dreams". I was thinking about the foundation/thermal insulation of a shipping-container-home and what would happen if the container would be just placed on polystyrene foam boards without any weight/pressure distributing layer between the container and the foam boards. Because of the weight of the container it would sink a certain depth into the soft polystyrene boards and I was interesting to see the "footprint" of the container floor sinking into the boards at certain depths of sinking into them.

Hi Dave, thanks for checking my model!

The floor is two times in the model. On the "left side" is the floor I started working with - the floor you have scanned with Solid Inspector².

On the "right side" is the "2 solid pieces floor".

Thanks pilou!

Ok, I've installed SolidSolver by Tig. I got so far that a random brut force combination of SolidSolver and SolidInspector² allowed me to "outer shell" all components in a one by one, not overly painful process, together.

The result is that I have now 2 big "pieces". Sketchup promts about one pieces that it is a solid but reagarding to the other piece sketchup promts "not a solid - but SolidInspector disagrees and says about the same piece "everything is shiny".

Any suggestion to make sketchup except the piece as a solid?

2 big pieces.skp

ISO Container floor.skpHi folks!

I've downloaded a realstic modell from the 3D warehouse, of a shipping container, made out of many components .

I'd like to "Solid Tools>Trim" the bottom of the container against a cuboid to see which negativ volume the bottom of the container creates.

But how do I do that?

I've tried the outer shell operation to create single solid of the many componants which make up the bottom of the container but that doesn't work ... either one more isn't a solid.

I've also tried the plugin MashWrapper, hoping that it could create an "outer shell" to use this shell as a solid but it takes forever and I am not sure if this is a good aproach for my problem anyway.

How do I transform the container bottom in a solid tool operable entity? Is there an easy way?

@garry k said:

Yes
The Mother component has an new variable that you add called Rotation.
Rotation starts out = 0
Click once and Rotation goes to 1
Click again and Rotation goes to 0

In a situation where you want more than 2 states - separate them by commas.

So for a 4 state variable where you might open and close the door in increments.
ANIMATESLOW("some variable", 0, 1, 2, 3)

Yea I get it now. It's basically math with functions and variables, variables which can be defined at one place to use it at another, not so complicated actually.

Thank you for your time Garry.

Especially -

@garry k said:

Think of it this way
The top most component (Mother) gets rotated 90 which rotates both the grey and the white panels.

Then rotate the gray one -180

• was an eye-opener.

Ok, I think I got it. I had a problem to understand what relates to what.

Which purpose has:
Custom
Rotation 0

?

The sole purpose of it is to display if the the state of onclick is set to 0 or 1 - is it?

@ JQL

I've just checked out your fb-gallery and I like your attic renewal, the material choice and integration of old stuff which was already at the attic before the renewal gives it a warm and cosy feeling. I also like pure minimalistic designs where warm wood tones are mixed with grey concrete tones, like your office, this is like wood and stone. This in combination with some plant green always works for me. Furthermore I like the tiny garden. I am interested in the utilisation of small spaces, like micro houses, micro homes, capsule hotels.

Garry and JQL thank you for your extensive answers. I'll process them tomorrow.

Thanks to the explanation:

@garry k said:

Think of it this way
The top most component (Mother) gets rotated 90 which rotates both the grey and the white panels.
Then rotate the gray one -180

it makes now perfectly sense to me.

Thanks for the help JQL! I really appreciat it. (unfortunately I can't open your file with my SU Pro 2014) However I understand nuts.

I have already a problem to understand what it means when you use symbols like ! and * in

=Mother!Rotation-90*

or
RotZ = Rotation*90

A principial logical problem which I have is that in my understanding the white component is only moving around axis z but the grey component is moving around axis z AND is sliding at the same time on axis x.

But there is nowhere something refering to - change position on axis x - for the grey component. There is only RotZ = other!Rotation-90* - It does not seem reasonable to me that this is enough when the grey component is ALSO MOVING on axis x.

I still have problems after setting the axes which I can not explain myself.

I've created a mother component in which I've nested two sub components of the same shape.

The mother component can rotate between -90° and 0. One of the nested components can also rotate (around it's own set axis) between -90° and 0

As long as I do not rotate the mother component the nested component just does what is should do which is rotating between 0° and -90°.

But the problem starts as soon as I have rotated the mother component to -90°. When the mother component is rotated at -90° the nested component is behaving strangly. Instead of rotating to -90° and 0° it is sort of jumping to -90° and then bouncing fast back.

I don't have a clue.

grau weiß nested dynamic components versuch.skp

@jql said:

... component's axis where you want your hinges to be

@garry k said:

the axis for the left most panel is the pivot point

Aahh! That's the thing. I did not set the axis.

(After some playing with the axis I also figured -angle values regarding axis rotations are clockwise and + angle values are counterclockwise.)

However to have to open each component, in order to "manually" control the whole motion sequence step by step is not as "sexy" as to use some sophisticated equation to do the whole job at once.

Thanks guys!

Well,ääääähhhhh??!

But isn't there a fancy mathematical formula (picture)for component 2 in need, to change position in conjunction with component 1?

Component 1 is just simply moving around axis z between 0° and 85° - which is relatively simple. I can understand that.

But to make component 2 to move in the specif intended conjunction with component 1 there is this mathematical formula needed(something trigonometric)

I wish I'd be less tupid. Thanks for handling me.

Thank you for your answer.

As I understand it your suggestion is only working for a single component.

I am a big noob in math and programming. But I think Onclick=Animateslow("Drawer",0,1,2,3) only applies for a single component.

At least I understand how I can controle the behaviour of a single componant with Onclick=Animateslow("Drawer",0,1,2,3).

But my problem is that I have two components which should move ( do something)together (at certain steps) at the same time.

Hi Sketchucation, it's been a while since I've been here the last time.

Today I started using dynamic components because this seemed usefull to me for my purposes but soon I experienced some problems.

Basically I like to do something like pulling out a drawer out of a drawer out of a drawer with the interact tool.

Do I have to nest in this example the 3rd drawer component in the 2nd drawer component and the 2nd drawer component in the 1st?

But then I have to acess first each sub component to be able to apply the interact tool which is unpracticall.

Is there an other way? Is there some video which could helpe me - I have not found one.

Actually I don't want to pull drawers out of drawers. I would like to do what you see on the picture.
The numbers represent a sequence of states. Think of it as a sort of shower door which step by step builds up a shover room. I want to do each step by using dynamic componants and the interact tool.

Ok thanks for the information - at least I know now it is not my fault which is usually the case.

@tig said:

OR... use my tool http://sketchucation.com/pluginstore?pln=HolePunchTool
to add associated reveal geometry to a hole-cutting component...

I'll check that out.

I just discoverd the "cut opening" function in the component dialog box.

I played a bit around and it works great except one thing:

I can not create a hole component which can cut holes through an entire object (from on face to the other), when I try to create such a component the "cut opening" check box in the "create component" dialog is not able to be selected.

Tomtom has already mentioned this behaviour in this tread.

Do I have to live with that or is there a fix?