modeling for physical output plus organic modeling

[buggy]

Hello,

I am wondering if anyone is using powerNURBS to create designs for production of physical objects, specifically injection molding of plastic parts? If so, any guidance from someone with experience in this regard would be great. A tutorial would be ideal. Basically I envision creating a hollow model, shelling it to the required thickness and setting up drafts (how can this be done with PowerShell since it sets a uniform thickness?), then creating the negative mold of it (with powerBoolean?) and then splitting it along separation lines, and building in channels for the plastic to flow and also sliders to make holes and undercuts, etc.

Related to this, I would like to model some objects that are organic in nature and wonder if PN is a good choice for this? I see examples of creatures and characters in the Rino web site gallery but not for PN. If so, can we see a few examples and tutorials? It doesn't have to be a whole character -- just something like say a hand would be good. Surface features such as wrinkles would have to be modeled since material maps wouldn't produce results in a physical mold.

I haven't used PN much since I purchased it (still on V 1.82) but would like to get into it more if I can get a better handle on it and if it looks like it is suited to the task. I have been building objects using polys and export to STL for rapid protyping, but as soon as I want to go to CNC machining or send it to solidworks engineers I run into a wall. Is there a straightforward process for converting a poly object to NURBS? It would be great if one could conform or slump a NURBS cage over a poly model and have it approximate the shape. . .

Thanks,

James

[buggy]

Any takers?

[Project 3D]

Hi there, I would advise looking into Alias, I am looking to purchase PNurbs, It's clearly a plugin that has the capacity to create surfaces with G3 continuity, however, it has not specifically been designed with direct to manufacturing in mind. I've been spending a huge amount of time recently looking in to all the options and there seems to be drawbacks with each and every one.

Pnurbs: Relatively inexpensive, high quality surfacing, good surface continuity, but also (from my experience) somewhat unstable, with little third party reference material available, and also, a small user base.

Rhino: Similarly inexpensive, medium-high surfacing, large toolset, with a good amount of third-party reference material, plugins for manufacturing output. However, in some ways, it's fundamental feature set (for example sweeps, fillets and 'network surfaces' lacks the powerful curvature continuity of Pnurbs.

Alias: You're talking tens of thousands for the full feature set (which includes all the g3+ surfacing), the most powerful toolset of any of these, direct to manufacture capability, used by almost all high-end automotive and aviation in-house studios. It can handle pretty much any manufacturing requirement, vast feature set, most importantly perhaps, it has a 'free' learning edition which has it's own native file format. Clearly the best thing out there by a considerable margin, with a great UI too.

PTC (wildfire) Solidworks etc etc, more on the manufacturing side than the 'design or concept side' both fairly expensive, PTC has better freeform surfacing than Solidworks, but both are heavily used in industry and PTC certainly can handle automotive/aviation /sculpted product design.

So basically, from my discussions with a large number of people in the industry, there's no perfect solution (other than perhaps alias) I am likely going to purchase a copy of powernurbs, it does worry that certain things may simply not be possible however, for concept work it may be ideal, but perhaps it is going a bit far to expect to be able to use it for full injection mould generation. It also worries me that a number of your posts have recieved no replies, as if, the features simply aren't there!?

Max

[npower]

Power NURBS is currently designed as a conceptual modeler to augment the existing 3DS Max conceptual modeling tool set. We are working closely with Autodesk to help improve our plug-in stability , Provide better Docs and feature help.


Eric