Hi. I’ve been using SU almost every day at work to model industrial objects. No houses, landscaping etc. Most seem to have been based on right angle type geometry where the 3 axes mostly seem sufficient. This week I had to make a very large N2 tank do the main body, and my starting point was making a big cylinder. But everything I then had to add to the cylinder in different places obviously couldn’t be places using the 3 present axes. Just wondering how experienced users would handle this??
I sort of fudged it by using the rotate tool a lot but it’s too imprecise. I think with groups or components you can create independent axes but I don’t have experience doing that - is that the best way to do that next time I need to or is there some other way? Thanks in advance!
It is possible to change the orientation of the model axes to make creating things off axis easier. My preference is to use guidelines instead. Although the vast majority of the time I model everything in place, in some cases I model aligned to the default model axes, use components whose axes are set to allow alignment to faces in the existing part of the model. Gluing properties may be useful in this case.
In this model, for example nearly everything was modeled in place. If it wasn’t, it was copied via Rotate/Copy or Move Copy after the first instance was created in place.
FWIW, my preference to model components in place as much as possible is done to reduce the work of moving things into place. It also means that often existing geometry can be used in the creation of other components.
I never move or rotate the default axes, I prefer to model everything aligned to the x and y axis, a lot of time I create groups or components with their own axes that aren’t aligned to the main ones all the time, like a roof beam or elements of a truss. My recommendation is to leave the default axes as they are. In your case you don’t even need accurate shadows since you’re not modeling architecture, and in the case you need it, there’s a plugin called solar north so you can model aligned to any axis and just change the angle of the north of the model.
I rarely care about shadows, and my stuff is fairly primitive compared to what I’m seeing out here now but…I had so much more difficulty getting things into position so they looked right. For example there were some rectangular openings in the main cylinder, so I was making an elongated box for example to push into the cylinder to make the rectangular shape. But trying to move it into the cylinder at the right angle turned out to be very challenging for me. I feel like I must be missing something!
Oh - I want going to change the default axes. I was thinking about making things using their own unique axes, even though I’ve never done that before…I think I get the general idea of it although I’m not clear about how easy or hard it is to like up the custom axis with wherever you might need it.
That’s an image directly from SketchUp. I’m sorry if it looks like a photo.
As for how I got the first part in the right place, the first component in that model was the base plate. It was drawn centered on the origin. The next part was modeled in place in top of the plate using the screw holes and other features on the plate as references. With the symmetry in this model I modeled the one on the left and used Flip/Copy to make the right side counterpart.
It’s just a matter of building up as you go.
I would urge you to get very comfortable with using Move and Rotate with accuracy and precision.They are obviously important tools. But also think about how you can simplify your work and reduce the chances of inducing errors. In models like these steam engines (there are two here) I don’t need to lay out the locations of features like screw holes on both parts. They are made on one part and then transferred to the mating part using Copy and Paste in place. With the second part modelled in place there’s no chance of mismatched holes. Like match drilling real parts in the shop.
Yeah, this happens a lot with curved stuff. I usually make a group or component and then change its axes to match what I need — makes adding parts way easier than rotating manually. Also, sometimes I make a temporary face or plane to draw on, then hide it later. Combine these and it’s much more precise.
