What % of you start with surfacing first

Trying to get a feel for this around the different industries about the
surfacing aspect of the program. Some I know dont even touch it, others are
all about it. The ones that are using it create some good organic surfaces
and then start to knit them and create solidbodies from them.

One of the major reason for asking is that there are some ID ppl that still
go back to Rhino and Alias, and someone asked me how useful I though the
surfacing tools were in SW.

chime on in...........

 

We rarely touch it. Although I think they are very nice features that allow
you to do many things that you couldn't with out them.

 

Never have used it here, but have often wondered if we were missing some
opportunities.

WT

 

I nearly always use surfacing these days since all the shapes we do come
from sketches and are inherently 'organic'. I find the surfacing tools
pertty good these days, but you need to spend the time and learn them, plus
there is always more than one way to do things, and it often takes several
of those before you're happy! But you do maintain your familiar working
environment, and the parametric functionality.

A few features that are making it better at the moment are 'surface fill'-
which can be great, 'fit spline' - which will be great in 2004 when it
maintains relationships, and the new guide-curve tangencies and previews in
the surface loft commands.

just my few pence worth.....

Lee

 

I've never used it in a work environment. I use sheet metal functionality
about 80% of the time, everything else is rather simple solid modeling.

 

Surface Surface Surface. there is no other way for me.

 

Depends on the part. The cool outside shapes get started as surfaces. The
clunky mechanical stuff on the inside gets built as solids. I probably build
ten times as many parts from solids, but I bet that I spend well over half
of my time, probably more than two-thirds, on the parts built from surfaces.

Jerry Steiger
Tripod Data Systems

 

For work-related modeling - I hardly ever use surfaces. In fact I can only
think of two or three parts I've needed surfaces on. But I do "play" with
surfaces - just so I know what is out there.

Adam.

 

Chime . . .

Boring prismatic part here . . . surfacing not used even once in five
years (ok maybe once or twice).

I generally resort to surfaces only when extremely bored . . .

BUT recently I found a GREAT use of surfaces in assemblies. I use the
offset surface to create a visual boundary around a part feature - to
see when other things in the assembly are geting too close - this is
absolutely great for me - I love surfaces for that reason alone.

Industrial designers ? . . . you mean those artsy-farsty types that
design all that unmanufacturable and expensive organic stuff . . .
those people . . . they like the surfaces . . . My brother in an
industral designer . . . and my wife too . . . help I'm surrounded . .
..

At least I can still be king of something, so whenever we talk I bring
up things like galvanic compatibility and simply smile at them as they
page thru that damn pantone color guide trying to determine if hippie
brown #4 is more cosmic than cyber blue #14 . . .

Surfaces - useful to many people more creative than I . . . ahhh its
great to know too much about fasteners . . .

SMA

 

I use surfaces for probably 30% of my parts. I think I use them as
frequently on prismatic parts as on complex shapes.

I use surfaces for "memory surfaces" (keeping a face intact when needed for
an operation later when the face has been consumed).

I use them with the Split tool when a sketch won't do it.

The "Fill" tool in sw04 has a switch which allows you to merge it with the
solid immediately, so it is in some respects no longer a strictly surface-
based tool. very cool.

You can extend and shorten imported parts with extruded shapes by using a
planar surface and the "replace face" function.

I use surfaces for molds whether the part is complex or simple.

For complex parts, I use surfaces when shapes have to be made face by face
instead of all at once, like with solids.

Sometimes I make a feature that has most of what I want, but one little
ugly spot. I cut out the uglies and use surfaces to patch it.

Sometimes its useful to use surfaces to create intersection curves. A
complex sweep and a revolve can give you a curve that you can't get using a
projected curve.

I use the edges of mirrored surfaces to work around the fact that you can't
mirror curves.

I rarely build parts from the ground up using only surfaces, but it happens
sometimes. In the end, surfaces are either workarounds for stuff you can't
do with solids, or reference geometry used to create solids.

....ok, ONE time, I did make a surface to try to machine from, but it was a
workaround for a sub-functional CAM program.

The reason to use applications like Rhino or Alias is to make shapes that
are difficult or "impossible" to make in parametric, feature based apps
like SW. Surfacing tools in SW are useful, but useful in a different way
from the surfacing tools in Rhino and Alias.



matt.