Twisted Pair Power Cable Modeled in Fusion

Oct 18, 2026 Last reply: 1 hour ago 4 Replies
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This build is a power cable that runs from an XT90E-M connector to a DJI O4 Air Unit Pro camera system, modeled in Fusion 360 and placed into a full drone assembly. When everything is put together, the finished routing sits between the XT90 connector and the video transmitter, with two separate insulated conductors and terminal housings as part of the completed cable.



The way it comes together is worth studying. The maker starts a new component called Power Cable2, offsets and references faces from the drone connector terminals, then builds construction planes and sketches circles that measure 2.50 mm across. A center guide spline path is drawn between the connectors, and a surface sweep with a twist angle generates the spiral guide geometry. From there, spline curves tie the twisted section back to the termination points, and solid sweeps produce the two conductors.



The detail that stands out to me is the 3D spline with tangent constraints connecting the sweep to the cable ends. That seems like the right call for keeping the transitions smooth where the spiral meets the straight runs. The material choices read well too: glossy red plastic on one conductor, matte grey or black on the other and on the housings. At most two cosmetic details there, and they carry real information about polarity.



One thing left open: the maker usually goes with 600 degrees of twist, but the exact angle used on this particular cable has not been stated. I would like to know whether it changed for this shorter run. My own take is that a fixed habit like that is handy, though matching twist to run length feels worth testing.


Curious about one step: when the faces from the connector terminals are offset and referenced, does the guide spline snap directly to those offset faces, or are new construction planes placed first and the sketch circles drawn on those? The order matters if I want to copy this workflow, and I could not tell from the tutorial alone.

I think referencing the terminal faces directly is the clever part. If the connector ever moves in the assembly, a cable anchored to those faces has a much better chance of following along than one drawn to loose points. The trade-off is extra setup at the start, but for a cable that has to land precisely on both ends, that seems like time well spent.

A variation worth trying: instead of separate spline connections after the twisted sweep, build the whole wire path in one 3D sketch using short line segments at the start, merge, branch and finish points, run the blend curve tool over them, then sweep the profiles along that blend path with the twist applied in a single operation. Fewer features to manage, and the twist would carry through without a seam.

On the twist angle: the maker has said they usually use 600 degrees, but the exact value chosen for this specific cable has not been stated anywhere, as far as I can tell. So the safe answer is that 600 degrees is the usual figure, and anything more precise for this build would be a guess.

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