FreeCAD: Path Array - Learn how make objects repeat, follow a path, align correctly and be tangent

hi viewers and welcome to the channel and today we're going to be looking at the path array this is available from the draft workbench and we're going to be understanding how to place objects along the path and have them tangent along there so if we had a curve like so you can see how they're tangent to that curve and follow that curve hugging it and keeping in line with it we'll be using standard geometry such as a sketch and then looking how to use that in a sweep and also using the curves workbench to actually have more control over the array and the how that attaches to the edge we'll be understanding the tangency how the profiles are aligned in the sketcher and how you can utilize the curse workbench join tool to alter the tolerance and continuity of that edge to affect the final outcome if you like this video please hit like and also subscribe to the channel i also have a kofi site where you can actually donate to my contributions to the community and that's at ko hyphen fi.com mang0 so we're in freecad and we're going to look at this tool first of all the tool we're looking at is on the draft workbench and it's on the modifications right tools and it's this path array here to use this it can be a bit tricky so what we need first is something to actually create an array of so i'm going to create a simple extrude and i'm going to place it along the x said plane there hit okay and i'm going to create a simple rectangle that sits around about here i'm not going to worry about constraints i'm just going to close that this is just for demonstration purposes so we've got our sketch and i'm going to come over to the part and i'm just going to strew that so this is the item that i want to make multiple copies of along a path so we've got that there actually give it a bit more extrusion so we've got that there and from the top we're looking down from it there and there's the front view i'm now going to create a path for it to follow so we can come over to the sketcher and we're going to create a sketch in here i'm going to place it along the just cancel that and place it along the z-wire plane there so new sketch why is it playing and okay so now we've got our block there and now we're going to place a sketch along here this follows a path but we can also follow an edge of the object which i'm going to be showing you after we've done this demonstration i'm going to use a b spline because they're notoriously difficult for catch users and if anything goes wrong it's going to go wrong with a b-spline so i'm going to create a shape with this b-spline zoom out a bit so we can see what we're doing and hit escape there hit escape again i'm just going to modify this something like that so that's the spline that i want this to be duplicated over let's click on right and we can see how we want that to be built along that spline there jump over to the draft workbench i'm going to start to use this tool so to use this tool it's also available from the arrays here so we've got path array there as well as on the modification menus ray tools and path array so we first need to select the object and then select the path and that can be a b spline a spline an edge etc to first select the object the extrude and then i'm going to select the path this one here i can also select it from this menu over here so we've got the object and the path modifications array tools and then half array let's place four copies along there now we can increase the count if we come down to the count and i'm going to set this one to something like 20. you can see 20 copies of that has been placed along that path we can see a bit of a problem here in that they're not tangent to the path i actually want the base of these touching this path so they follow tangent to that path to do that we come into the path array and this can be a bit tricky the first one we see under here is alignment we set that to true and straight away you can see a problem in that it's actually aligned this correctly for a certain axis coming to the line mode let's set this to tangent and click off you can see we've still got the problem let's come back to our path array what we want to look at is this tangent vector so i'm just going to pull this up so we can see that let's open this out at the moment the vectors on the x so i'm going to hit zero and place it along the y we can see now we've got this tangent to that path but the top is touching the path rather than the bottom and all we need to do is set the force vertical here to true that places it along the top of clicked off and that takes effect control r or edit refresh does exactly the same thing so we've got that false vertical in there and that's all following that path now if we took this sketch and changed the path then this will follow that path it's fully parametric we'll follow that path one problem that might occur when you create these profiles to actually sweep along that path is where you actually place them in 3d space at the moment this is placed correctly in our point of origin if we move this over to the right hand side for instance if we was referencing external geometry by importing an edge then this will be incorrect it will actually appear to be disconnected from that path even if that path wasn't running through the origin point i created an array across an external edge that is not running through the point of origin we've got other modifications in there as well so i'm just going to hit ctrl z to bring that back and hit ctrl r just to refresh that so sitting along that path there go into the path array as well as tangent vector we've got vertical vector here so you can see that vertical vector is to do with this line that runs and touches the bottom the actual path is following if i come into the path array and change that vertical vector so z and use a minus one in there it will flip that to the top so we can change this vertical vector to whatever we want to get a different look and feel for the path array i'm just going to leave it with a set of one like so so that is all tangent to that path what happens if we're placing this on an object so i've just started a new document and what we're going to do is create a sweep across a path and then create an array of objects along that path i'm going to come over to the sketcher and i'm going to create a profile to sweep across that path so i'm going to create a new sketch along the xz plane this is going to be my profile so we're looking for the center and we're going to place our profile along here again i'm just going to create something like a rectangle there and maybe have something just removed from the middle i'm just going to use the trim tool in here just to remove this from here and these two edges and also delete this i'm not going to worry about constraining this down i'm just going to make these two symmetrical to this line you'd also fully constrain your sketch we just make sure this isn't of some small size so we've got let's say 10 millimeters along there and also bring this up a bit and with a bit of a gap okay so we've got this let's close that so that's our profile i'm now going to place a path for this to follow don't click click on right so this is where i want the path to be right in the middle of here so that's the yz plane look at the handle down the bottom right and and click off make sure that new sketch isn't attached to anything and i want the yz or zy plane okay that so we've got that profile sitting there and i'm going to create a beast plane again can be whatever one you want i'm just going to stick to a b-spline and place that along there hit escape and we're just going to change the curvature of this something like that i'm now going to sweep this across that profile so we take the sketch but we need to be in the part we can use the part design if we so desire and we need the sketch that we're going to be using and the path for the sweep can use the utility sweep also available in part sweep we need to click our profile which if we click on the left hand side there it will highlight press the right arrow and we're going to create this as solid as well so i'm going to click solid click sweep path and it'll ask for the actual path so we select it from our for you click done looks like it hasn't done anything don't hit this button again just hit okay and that'll sweep it across there like so so we've got this track here now now before we were selecting this edge here instead we want to select this edge to create our array along but first of all we need something to place along here so i'm going to create something simple along here i'm going to go back to the sketcher and we're going to give ourselves a bit of room make sure nothing's selected and create a sketch we're looking along the zx plane or the xz plane okay that this side is flush with this makes life a lot easier i'm going to create just something simple and i'm going to place it along here so i'm going to bring in this edge and i'm going to place just a simple profile along there so that's attached there i'm going to close it and bring this out a bit so i can see what we're doing go to the part and we're going to extrude it by something like two mil yeah okay that's extruded that by two mil that's a bit too big actually so let's come into it and do it by 0.5 bit less 0.25 so that's sitting along there it's not touching you can see that the tangency is only to this edge here i'm now going to come over to the draft workbench we're going to select the extrude and then control click this edge here go up to the modifications array tools and path array we can see that path array has moved over to the left hand side but we're looking at the path object sweep and sweep edge is 15 there which is this one here which is correct we can come into our extrude and double click it and i'm going to take the constraints off of this and move this over in this way and we can disturb what actually happens to this so you can see it's moving over if i have it touching the center line and hit close you can see how that is hovering over that center line there and let's move this down to the point of origin here i should have constrained this but we're still working with this so that's okay let's close that and you can see that is now on that edge so it's important to know as in with our original sketch our original path as it's here that if the sketch is not on the point of origin then it will deviate from the path even if the path is over here so you can't actually use this path it's going along here and import these points along here to match up to the path because we have to think of it from the point of origin let's close that let's have a look what we've got so we've got these sitting along this edge i want to embed them slightly into that edge so i'm going to come into the sketch and i'm just going to move this down a bit i should really constrain this something like that and hit close so those are slightly into that edge now come on to the path array and let's just increase this to something like 50. let's bring this down a bit so we have some space in between so we can see what we're doing again we've got a problem with tangency so we hit the path array and what we need to do is come in alignment true those all lined end to end which i don't want so we come into the line mode so that's tangent sometimes that will solve it if not we come into the tangent vector zero on the x one on the y that's tangent to that vector now and click origin you can see how that changes let's come back down to the line mode let's try free net this should stack it on top of there like so so following that got some interesting breaks in there so i'm going to stick with the aligners true and the tangent so it's touching there a little tangency there which is fine let's have a look at the extra translation and we're going to translate along the x-axis and let's try minus one millimeter and you can see how far that translates over so we have to be careful with this because it does seem to nudge it quite a long way so near 0.1 and let's change this to a minus and something like 0.5 0.8 and i think it's going to be about 0.6.2 something like that there we go so we've got those along that edge there all the way along and up and we can increase the number so let's come down and increase the number so we've got 30 at the moment so let's get this back up to 50. and those are sitting along there we can then do some booleans or some unions with this so for instance that's being placed along there and i can go into the path array hit click on the sweep control click the path array and come over to the part workbench and do a cut along there and that will cut that into our object so we've left with a texture going all the way along there one other thing we can do if we get rid of that cut and i'm going to get rid of the path right is i'm going to try something different this time i'm going to make use of something called the curse workbench and we can come into here and actually extract out this curve if you haven't got the curves workbench you'll need to install it from the tools add-on manager you'll find the curves workbench in there and you just click it and you look down and you'll find it sitting here close out there so we can select the edge and we can use something called a joint tool so if we look along here this joints let's edge into a b spline curve also available on curves join curves you can see there's a purple line purple curve that runs along there that's extracted out that join curve there and we can use that to place our extrude across so we've got our strude which is sitting down here and we can come over to the draft we can take the extrude and the join curve and do exactly the same applications array eroticals half array and that places it directly upon that curve like so let's try that again let's get rid of that drawing curve matter of fact let's place another joint curve in there so here and come to the curse workbench and use the drawing curve again and what i'm going to do is just click on that path array and then select the other join curve and hit okay and that's flipped it over to the other side you can see we've got a problem because what's done just it's basically taken that and moved it so the other edge sits on there so we might need to do some amendments with that the other thing you can do is if we just change it back to the original drawing curve okay that and click and we don't need this one anymore we can come in and change that path array and change it to allow it to join up much more effectively with that edge so i'm going to do a count in there make sure it's the line is true and also line mode or origin tangent that one and also force vertical that's true tangent vector and stick that to one along the y to flip it around and zero along the x that's sitting along there nicely now you can see how that sits along there and of course if we had that say on here and we're in the curse workbench and use the join curve there and flip them between the two we can see that that places that directly upon there now now we've added all that and it sits there nicely so we've got a joint curve well what we can do is come down to the shape approximation down here set that to true and we can affect how closely this follows that curve so we've got some deviation on here which this one is is quite good we can actually fix that to an extent with degrees max and the tolerance so i'm going to place the tolerance above zero see how that's changed of a sudden change that degrees max sets 1750 you'll probably see this dropped to 14 that's the maximum degrees we can go and i can press the up arrow on the degrees min and hit ctrl r and you can see how we can modify that shape of that path array along that curve we've got items like continuity in there which may or may not have an effect on that and we can bring down this tolerance to 0.5 normally find the tolerance of one it's best to allow you to start modifying this we can play with this and change how this actually looks there's another tip there so you can actually use the curse workbench and use these tools up here and rather than attaching them to the object itself you can actually attach them to a curve derived from that object for more control over that so i hope that was helpful please keep an eye on the channel because throughout the week i'll be releasing more videos around the curse workbench around modeling new free cad around animation as well and i'm going to be bringing back the programming series as well and i've got a new and upcoming project for that so that's gonna be releasing series two of the python programming from a free hat perspective hope you're enjoying the channel and i hope to see you again soon if you like what you're seeing please subscribe to my site and also i have a cofi site where you can actually donate a few pence or a few pounds dollars whatever your currency is and that's at ko hyphen fi.com ming0 and there you'll be able to help me fund my site and all the money that i actually get from any funds will actually get pushed back into the channel thanks a lot for watching and subscribing i'll see you next time

Channel: MangoJelly Solutions for FreeCAD

Views: 9,998

Keywords: CAD, three, 3D, CNC, Printing, solidworks, autoCAD, draft, 0.19, 0.20, free cad, beginner

Id: -JcZ2geFY3Q

Length: 25min 26sec (1526 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 06 2021