I was referring to numerous other threads as well, but yeah necros are never helpful 
Sorry, don’t mean to necro bump.
Sorry that I have not added any videos in awhile, I’ve been very busy lately.
I am working on some videos now about cutting parts and bending parts and may have them uploaded today!
I am having problems with Inventor opening.
Has this happened to you?
It may be that my computer is older, don’t know…
What is your problem specifically?
I open Inventor, then it just shows the start up picture and locks up. It will not open at all.
I have this problem with Autodesk Showcase on my computer. Showcase is still a fairly new program(I am pretty sure it is) though and they may still be working on some of the problems it has. Unlike Showcase, Inventor has been around for awhile so I am not sure if it is your computer or the program.
However, I also have a small RAM computer with no dedicated graphics card so it does freeze up on me, but not when I am starting the program.
My conclusion is that you do not have enough processing power to run it. I am no computer expert though so you should send Autodesk an email, and see what they say.
I just uploaded a new video today. It is how to bend parts and can be found here. I actually created this video in early November but I did not have time to edit it.
Please suggest your video ideas! I am running out!!!
Your bend radius is not the distance between the end point on the arch its the distance to the imaginary point that would create that bends circle. Also a one thousandths bend radius is pretty tiny. normally the smallest radius you can have is the total thickness of the material from my understanding, so in AL case 1/16 inch bend radius ± a couple of thousandths is the absolute min.
Keep up the good work.
- Andrew
These are really helpful to learn the ropes!
How does one find the center of mass of an assembly? S^3’s library has masses I think.
Also, is it possible to make a complicated arm (like a 4-bar) rotate? I haven’t played around with that much.
Is there a way to adjust how the camera rotates? When I go into perspective view the zoom and rotate get all buggered up.
How does one find the center of mass of an assembly?*
I am installing Inventor right now so I can provide you with an answer once it is done installing. I know it is in one of the ribbon menus, but I just can’t think of the one off the top of my head.I had it reimaged today that is why I have to install.
Is it possible to make a complicated arm (like a 4-bar) rotate?
Yes! You can do probably anything in Inventor (easily after you get the hang of it). You just constrain the pieces you want together through tangent constraints and that allows it to rotate. Thanks for the idea, I will probably post a video on how to constrain pieces to form complex arm/lift systems.
*
Is there a way to adjust how the camera rotates?*
I am sort of confused by this question. Do you use a mouse or mouse pad? It is difficult to rotate camera through the mouse pad (but it can be done!). Can you give me a more detail explanation? I could probably help you better. I will look into your problem tomorrow when Inventor is done installing.
How does one find the center of mass of an assembly?
Ok, I finally have it installed Inventor and you find to COG in the view option in the Ribbon. Inside of the view tab, you will see Center of Gravity option on the left. You should talk to Jordan from 24C about COG, he used it in his CAD work. I have not used it yet.
I still am confused about your question about the camera.
The CoG feature is extremely helpful – also, mad props to drbayer for posting a tutorial on Inventor. This has helped our entire team in designing our robot BEFORE building it :).
Also, a useful thing that I’ve found with Autodesk Inventor is if you right click on your assembly, click on “iProperties”, go to the last tab and click “Update”, you can find out how much your design weighs (if you’re using a CAD library that has all the weights).
Again, thanks Drbayer, you’ve made CAD’ing with Vex so much easier!
Your welcome! I am very happy that people are finding it useful!
I have not tried the iProperties weight feature, next time I am in Inventor I will try it out.
I’ll try the CoG thing when I fire up Inventor next, thanks!
I figured out the 6-bar/4-bar thing, but sometimes the arm gets “twisted up” because the constraints do not limit the shape to a parallelogram. I’ll probably just do a rotation constraint between two parts of the arm and call that a day.
As for the camera question:
When I’m trying to constrain two standoffs together (for example), I zoom in to one end of one of the standoffs to select the face, then when I try to get to the corresponding face of the other standoff, simply holding shift and the mouse wheel to rotate the view does more panning than actual rotating. Do you know of a way to select what point you rotate about while rotating the camera with the mouse? That would make it a lot easier to constrain two opposing planes.
I was wondering If anyone knows how to mate axle collar to a axle?
Constrain the axis of the shaft with the axis of the shaft collar. You will need to zoom in on the end of the shaft to be able to select it’s axis.
first constraint selection.
https://vexforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=4852&stc=1&d=1322422363
second constraint
https://vexforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=4855&stc=1&d=1322422411
done.
What jpearman described keeps the axle in line with the collar, but if you want them to rotate together, you’ll have to do a rotational constraint (in the same window as the regular constraints, just a different tab). If you want the collar to be a fixed distance from the end of the axle, set a constraint between a point on the collar (probably the middle of the hole on one of the side faces) and the axle (probably the end), then make an offset.
Haha, we’re modeling out a six bar in Inventor too – the best solution that I’ve found for preventing the arm to get in a weird, non-parallel shape is to do an angle constraint. To do this, you go to constraints, select the type as “Angle”, the solution as “Directed Angle”, then click on the two faces you want to keep parallel and set the angle to be either 0 or 180. Works like a charm.