Hi,
I am a bit new to SU and can’t figure out how to use the push/pull to create an angled hole in a rectangular solid. For the project I am making I need to drill a hole at a 25 deg. angle to a specified depth. Let me know if this makes sense and any advice you can give
Push/Pull is the wrong tool for this… in terms of pushing/drilling an angled hole.
Do use the push/pull for the two objects you need to make. But think of them both as two solid objects.
- the Rectangular Solid
- the Drill Hole Solid,… an extruded circle which you can size to match your drill hole size […using the value control box VCB].
- Group each object individually, so they are two independent solids (and thus won’t stick to each other).
- Use the rotate tool to rotate the drill hole solid [enter 25 into the value control box VCB]
- the Move tool to position the drill hole into place.
- Finally Use the Subtract Tool from the Solid Tools Set to subtract the ‘drill hole solid’ from the ‘rectangle solid’.
- The drill hole will need to be long enough to fully extend past the face of the rectangle otherwise your hole will end up being buried below the surface.
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some extras steps which are worthwhile:
- change the view to X-Ray mode to see things better.
- use guide lines to accurately position the hole. although you can move the hole around after you make it so there is flexibility here.
@JimD’s advice is good assuming you have the Pro version. Your profile says Make, so you need to use a different technique starting with the step involving the Subtract Tool (which is Pro only). This intersect-with method does the same thing as the Pro Subtract Tool, but with more manual work.
- cut (delete) the drill hole group, open the slab for edit, and then paste in place.
- explode the pasted drill hole group (with the slab still open for edit)
- select all the geometry in the opened group and right-click invoke Intersect Faces With->Selection
- erase the extra geometry where the drill group protrudes from the surfaces of the slab and the “hole” faces in the surfaces of the slab.
I tried following @JimD 's advice but I am unable to select a second solid to subtract the first one. I currently have the subtract tool because I have the 30 day free trial of Pro but I still can’t get it to work. I am not advanced enough to try to follow @slbaumgartner 's advice. I have attached (hopefully) what I have completed so far. Any help would be great
…By the way, my objective is to “drill” out the angled mouth
Gumball.skp (219.6 KB)
See if you can follow this.
I used ‘Cut’ to copy and temporarily remove the cylinder, then opened the group for editing via double click, deleted the circle, as it only gets in the way, used ‘paste in place’ to put the cylinder back but this time within the group, exploded the cylinder so all the raw geometry is touching, used ‘intersect faces with selection’ to combine the pieces and deleted the excess.
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Thank you Thank you. That worked great. I appreciate the time taken to lay out the process.
That was because your 2nd object isn’t a solid. or at least it’s not a ‘true solid’ according to SketchUp. and of course, it’s SketchUp’s definition that matters here. We can call it anything we want, and that’s not going to change the outcome even a little bit.
So because you’ve stumbled upon this in a natural way, It’s worth looking into why the Subtract Tool didn’t work for you, and probably the best thing to learn here is how to troubleshoot this sort of problem when it does occur again, as it undoubtedly will.
The 1st thing to realize I suppose, is that SketchUp is rather picky about what it calls a solid (and you need to learn what this term ‘solid’ means in the SketchUP world).
The 2nd thing to know is that we don’t have to guess what SketchUp is thinking, because SketchUp reports the status of these things within the ‘Entity Info’ window. You can test your objects (i.e. Groups, or Components) by simply selecting them and looking at what the entity info window report (but don’t select multiple objects when doing this, you won’t get the detailed info you need).
The rest of it comes down to skillful troubleshooting of the problem when it does show up.
Keeping your eye on the entity info window as your creating your groups (or components) is a good way to validate the quality of your so called solid geometry as your building the model.
Making use of other tools is another good approach, and as far as I know the best tool for troubleshooting solid problems is a plug-in called Solid Inspector2. That plug-in will not only report on what the problems are, but it will also provide a fix button that often fixes the issues automatically, OR points you to where the problem areas are so that you can fix them manually.
And I certainly don’t want to short change the benefits of doing things manually. Learning how to look at your model by eye and manually adjusting the problems as they come up is a great skill to have, and work on. and I’d even call it essential because if you develop this early on, you’ll bypass many issues due to careless or poor modeling practices or methods. and you’ll simply have less stuff to trouble shoot in the long run.
If you go back and look at the state of your model as it exists in your attached .skp file… You should see that the Entity Info window reports 2 different results for each of the 2 objects.
The mouth is listed as a Solid Group, while the Face is just listed as a Group.
Closer inspection of the radius as it’s turning the corner shows the problem of the Face group. You have a little missing line… which I should have technically called an edge. If you explode the group, and draw in a new line there, and then regroup. you should find that everything will work well… not just for the Entity Info window but also for the Subtract tool since you now have 2 truly solid objects which you can use it on.
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That was one of my biggest issues starting out or being so consumed with following along with a Y/T video. Or just to hyped up about getting it right was the reason it was coming out wrong. I was off the point I should have been connecting and getting incomplete or “strange” extra faces. SU will give you hints but I was not seeing them as it is part of the learning curve. Nice explanation also as there is no Tool Icon to click for SU`s principles… as Dave Richards called it the need for Clean Modeling. …Peace…
Thank you for the bits of wisdom. I am trying to learn the terminology and understand exactly what is meant by each term. Troubleshooting is definitely a valuable skill to have in many aspects of life.
I’m unsure on what tools I would use?
Please could you help me.