Spring Animation

Here are some files I put together 2 weeks ago to show a way to do it,..

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want

Look at the Elliptical Spring on page 5. The underlying geometry is a normal helical spring. (He makes it elliptical by anisotropic scaling.) It looks like he uses equations to drive the helix. You could do the same, if you prefer that to Paul's approach.

Jerry Steiger

Cool use of Wrap! It hadn't occured to me that you could wrap something mulitple times around cylinder.

Jerry Steiger

Not sure if this has been said already but I like to use the sweep command to do a helix.... stay with me... not the normal way... draw a line (the hieght) and a circle on the same plane (different sketches) make the centre of the circle inline with the bottom of the line.

now use the sweep tool. the circle should be 90deg out from the normal way you would do a sweep. select the path and profile as normal. use the twist/orientation and choose twist along path. I use no of rotations but you can specify an angle too. The path line can be any shape you like... not just a line.

You can drop this into and assebly and use incontext relations to relate the path (line) to other parts. or just animate the hieght of the line.

hoep that make sense. Justin

I used macro to change the height of spring and rebuild it. and then it looks like a actual spring working. If you need I can upload those files.

Deepak

want

To keep it simple: Model a spring using standard method of helix and sweep command. Use equations to relate the height of the helix to the length of an incontext line in your assembly. The incontext line, in the case of a compression spring, references the gap between the two components between which the spring is installed. Animate the two components and the spring will update.

Matt

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want

Im unclear on this, i have the files but its simular to my situation, there seems to be no inbuilt way of animating like in your video, which is exactly what i want. When i try to move the spring stays solid and the endplate moves up and down. Can you go through exactly what you did to animate it, step by step?

Deepak, that would be great

Maybe someone has a better way or a super fast computer with some super auto resolve processor running but for the spring to update in real-time or dynamically or after you just move the piston...I don't think it's gunna happen.

For the spring to update after moving the piston rod, you have to REBUILD the model to resolve for the new spring height. You have to click on the Red/Green light icon, Edit/Rebuild or Ctrl-B. Again, it does NOT update automatically or dynamically or in real time. If you have Animator installed, just click on the Animator1 tab to see the frame settings... I'm just moving the piston down and up within 3 seconds.

Anyway, the spring geometry is as simple as it gets, no equations, no macros, no whatever,.. just good ole plain jane geometry, just like a spring would be wound and with mates driving the height change, as close to real would as you can get,.. it's not a perfect spring but close as simple gets.

btw, the help speed rebuilds up,..

- Change the Document Properties/Image Quality/... all to Lower values or what is visually tolerable.

- Set to Lightweight

- Turn Off "verification on rebuild"

- and,.. get a super computer

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want

Thanks that is brilliant, i am not working on adapting Jerry steiger ^^^'s spring, but cannot seem to relate the hieght of the spring to my components, he has used a external reference but there seems to be no way to edit this for my own part. Anyone know a solution?

Thanks again

Ben

No worries, worked it out meself, Just had to delete the relation and make a new respective one for my part

Oh, and thank you all, and i appoligise for my silliness in places :D

Here is the link of the avi file of Spring Animation. I will soon uploading the Solidworks files also.

Deepak

Paul, At SWx World I will be showing a real-time-updating-compression-spring- workaround based on this thread. I have a pretty slow computer at home, but on it I developed a 'better way' for animations that I can extend or compress while dragging the mated components. For those who can't go, a couple of solutions will be up on the Dimontegroup.com website a week or so after the show. Ed

Ahmm.... so,.. why can't you just post the data for us to see now???

Why does someone have to go to a show to see this or wait until after??

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Here is the link of the spring file I have made. Hope it work for the one looking for it. Pls post your comments/ suggestions to make it much better.

Deepak

Sorry, Paul - I'm just way too busy for the next week. After the show I have time to clean the models up and get them posted for download.

And I agree - no need to go to the show. Since my first presentation I have shared everything with folks over our website.

and very nice of you too Mr Eaton...looking forward to seeing the latest.. ;o)

You very mean man, Mr. Eaton... ;^)

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