baradhili
baradhili

Reputation: 584

Make a solid mockup from an assembly in solidworks aka a shrinkwrap

I have a complex assembly that I want to make a 3d printed mockup from. I don't want to have the 3d printer wasting tons of time and filament drawing in every shaft, bearing etc..

Is there a way to make the entire assembly into a single solid (or better still a hollow shell)?

Drawing is here

EDIT:

Attempts so far -

  1. extracted model to STL and passed it to http://www.cadspan.com/ - but UI is confusing and I can't see how to download the shrink-wrapped model

  2. extracted stl and imported it into OpenSCAD - used difference function to "scoop out" the insides (specifically the heat exchanger, bearings and bolts) - render to stl - this was the first one to drop below 1kg of filament - I think there is something better, but this is what I went with 865g, 3+ days of printing :) lets hope no errors

Upvotes: 1

Views: 3171

Answers (2)

HJbuhrkall
HJbuhrkall

Reputation: 36

  1. The traditional way of creating simplified models for prototypes or simulations, will require you to create a new configuration, and supressing the things you want to skip; this is however a time-consuming operation (but sometimes needed).

  2. today we can use either 'Simplify', or 'Defeature' from within Solidworks. The end-result will be somewhat similar to 1. but the system will handle the suppression of components & features, and create derived configurations for you.(based on a size criteria you set up)

  3. Manually saving the Assembly as a part-file, will allow you to select 'Surfaces-only' and will result in and empty shell of all the geometry. The one caveat here is; that any internal parts that has surfaces in the assembly, will still have surfaces after saving it (the system cannot differentiate between inner/outer surfaces)

Edit

  1. Depending on how important this is for you, you could also go through the 'Cavity' function in Solidworks; making an impression of the assembly into a solid block of material, then deleting all bodies no longer attached to the outer surface; reparing any holes or extra details, and completing by making anew impression, this time of the cavity in your solid block of material.

Upvotes: 1

wzboss
wzboss

Reputation: 17

You can save an assemnly file into part file in Solidworks, just use save as, then select "part".

But your actual goal is to "save filament", the 3D print software should have a setting for that, it usually name as "Infill Percentage", or infill density. Set this to 100% mean fill all volume with plastic, set it to a value that you think it has right balance between filamenet and strenth.

You should be able to set the patterns as well.

Some reference picuture are like: enter image description here

Upvotes: 0

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