Another great article from Dave Richards

Good article! I can relate to the angled parts situation. To fix the bounding box orientation, I've been copying the component, exploding it, make it square to the ground plane, restore it as a component, then rotate back to the desired position. Now that I know about using the "Change Axis" operation, that'll be much easier! I've used "Change Axis" in other situations, but not this one.

Thanks, Dave!!!
 
Last edited:
Thank you, gentlemen.

Bill, I'm glad this Change Axis thing will streamline your work. The method you were using is a lot of unneeded work.

I know of some people who just draw all their parts on axis and then move and rotate them into position. To me that seems like working harder, not smarter. You have to know all of the dimensions of the part to draw it. By drawing the parts in place, you let the parts you've already placed (correctly) determine at least some of the dimensions. With practice it becomes trivial to change the axes to align correctly with the part.
 
Thank you, gentlemen.

Bill, I'm glad this Change Axis thing will streamline your work. The method you were using is a lot of unneeded work.

I know of some people who just draw all their parts on axis and then move and rotate them into position. To me that seems like working harder, not smarter. You have to know all of the dimensions of the part to draw it. By drawing the parts in place, you let the parts you've already placed (correctly) determine at least some of the dimensions. With practice it becomes trivial to change the axes to align correctly with the part.

Guilty! And to have to modify them after was a pain too, rotate to the main axis, modify, then rotate back...I'll be using this from now on.
 
... Bill, I'm glad this Change Axis thing will streamline your work. The method you were using is a lot of unneeded work. ...

I feel kinda dumb now, not thinking to apply the axis change as you show. I've had to changes axes in situations like re-sizing a component where I moved part of it away from the established axes, defining a knob center, etc. Since I'm doing mostly CNC work now using mostly VCarve Desktop, I'm not using SU like I did but I still rely on it for all other drawing.
 
Top