dsulli

I believe that you are talking about moving sketches around before extruding them or creating a profile that is made of various shapes. First, use the move tool and select (snap-to) a reference point on the square or circle. Drag the shape onto a reference point on the other shape. Next, select the move tool again and this time right-click and drag the geometry you wish to move to a precise location. Move it any distance and an X-Y direction input window will appear. Enter the desired dimensions and you're done. Remember though, that most of the time, it is easier to drag a shape from one of the many catalogs, and then build upon or subtract from it. As far as positioning holes and shapes that are part of other shapes (in 3D), you can use the TriBall or select the smart dimension tool to lock-in the measurement. Good luck and welcome to the family of IC users. Dave

...and don't forget the ability to populate all holes with the appropriate screws as well. Dave

Wow, I am certainly impressed with Howard's vast array of MCAD programs in use at his company. You and Joe Greco have alot in common. And Rick's comparison of Apple with MS is a good one, although there are far more MCAD programs than there are operating systems. Out of all the MCAD programs out there, it surely looks like SolidWorks is dominating the field. Our company has both SW and IronCAD and the only two reasons I can see that anyone here uses SW is because they have to modify/query models that were generated by outside companies or because they wish to be marketable in case they decide to leave our company to go to another. By the way, I saw recently that SW 2004 is touting hole charts and photo-realistic materials; I guess they are still playing catch-up in many ways! Dave

Maybe I'm not understanding your question, but after you thicken a surface, you can right-click on the correct red handle (in intellishape mode) and "edit distance". If this is not what you're referring to, it may help to attach a sample image.

Congratulations Mr. Anderson!

Could you show hidden lines in the drawing view and then create a center line going to the hidden hole using "edit view"? This is what I would do.

Great! I will order a white one and when you do have one available, please send it my way. Dave

Thanks Mike! For those of you who do not know Mike Twining, he is a resident IronCAD guru of astronomical proportions (hey, I have to return your kind words, don't I). Seriously, Mike was my answer man at our local IronCAD VAR (value-added retailer) a short while ago. I'm glad he is still with us; certainly, he is a valuable asset to this great group of people. To answer your questions, yes, I rendered the image of the three transducers. I used as a guide, the tutorial that anyone can download from this site. The riverbed rocks came from one of the catalogs in IronCAD and I enclosed the transducers in a giant box to better control the lighting effects. I hope to create a rendering of each of our hottest-selling products (even the ones I didn't design) for a calender. Thanks again for noticing and remembering your old student! Dave Sulli

Okay Tom, I have a question for you. I love the look, but why black? We California people will roast alive with a black shirt! Are there any plans to offer a white one like the originals? Thanks, Dave

There are many, many such improvements I am reminded of regularly, especially in the 2D area of designing. I'll always remember my Autocad days of constant frustration, and I don't even want to THINK about ACAD 3D - yikes! It's the incremental improvements that make a good program great. IC has certainly made tremendous strides over the past few years...here's to many more!

quote:Originally posted by mmccall: If you need to get the area of a face, Select the face of the part until you are at the face mode (green outline) Right click and select the "create surface shape" Then run the "tools - analysis" to to get the surface area. id=quote>id=quote> Oops, it looks like you forgot one small step: After creating surface shape, you MUST click on the surface once more so that it is outlined in blue before running the "tools-analysis".

You can also do the same thing by right-clicking on the top plane of the triball, dragging it a bit in the direction of the proposed pattern and selecting "rectangular pattern".

That's great - thanks!

quote:Originally posted by djohannesen: Please refer to the attached file. Refer to the 'rear' column, & you will see a gap between the top of column & the roof beam. What method(s) does everyone use to: a/ move the bolting plate to mate with roof beam I use the Mate Align tool to assemble the two. b/ extend the column to mate flush with the plate. I believe that you can simply right-click on the end-handle, select "to point", and then select the bottom surface of the recently-moved bolting plate. Also, the overhang at the front is to have its' length dimensioned from the 'intersection' of the front face of the column & the roof beam. Again, I use a 2D sketch as I don't know of any way to refernce to the 'intersection' in the model. Are you talking about dimensioning in the scene? It's much easier to dimension in the 2D drawing. You can shade any or all views and export to PDF. All replies greatly appreciated as I tend to sketch the profiles, trim & determine lengths to move/extend. e id=quote>id=quote> id=red>

quote:Originally posted by Chris Lohman: but for home I build my own clones. id=quote>id=quote> Amazing! Chris, you're the ONLY person I know who actually builds his own laptops! Where in the world do you find all the parts? Dave

Great idea!

I believe the info in this thread still applies> http://www.ironcad.com/support/community/index.php?showtopic=417 You must first install the free viewer program before being able to convert ICD files to PDF.

Great job, Urban and team! We'll be rooting for you Dave

quote:Originally posted by mwalls: I guess I would say that any screw is going to have some type of drive hole such as a slot or philips, so I see no point in having a screw without a way to put it in. You could make a regular screw, and then remove the slot. You then can drag a copy of it into your own catalog to be able to drop in the fastener any other place you would want. Am I missing something? I just don't see the need to have it as an option when all screws and bolts have some sort of drive mechanism which is covered in the features when building a fastener. Mike id=quote>id=quote> Yes, fasteners require a drive mechanism, but threaded rod does not. I've also used screw threads to make hand knobs and other custom hardware, where a drive mechanism in the end of the threaded rod is not necessary.

Fire GL 8800, X1, Z1, and even Fire GL-2 cards work great with IronCAD.

What I've done is create the "hollow" shape as a positive object, copy it (to save the original in case changes need to be made later on), select "set operation" under the "Shape" pull-down window, and pick "negative". Place it into the main, larger part and boolean it out. I do this all the time to create silicone molds from "masters".

The first time always takes longest, in my experience. Once you've opened and closed IC, subsequent openings are executed much faster.

Are you exporting as a TIFF file?

I took a home-study internet course on Tool Design last year. It was great! The school is 2000 miles away, yet I never felt that I was disconnected from the teacher and class in any way. The benefits include NOT spending time and money (for gas) on the road. I highly recommend classes like this, even if they are just refresher classes.

Holy cow! I thought you had left the clan! Welcome back, Mike. It sounds like you haven't tried the latest version of IronCAD. 2D is vastly improved over version 2 and 3 that you had mastered. Try the download and you'll see that Joe is right. There still aren't as many gizmos as in SolidWorks, but Joe did deem IronCAD as the best in the world when it comes to conceptual design and presentation. It's good to hear that you are still an IronCAD guy. Dave Sulli RD Instruments