Computer-Aided Design

COMPUTER AIDED DESIGN💻💻💻

Welcome back to school!!😭😭 This week we mainly did administrative work such as team formation and setting of the team's ground rules. But other than the boring stuff, we also did a small activity which was to make a keychain similar to what we did in ICPD except this time we will be laser cutting it instead of 3d printing. That will be Part 1 of this week's entry. The 2nd Part is to use Fusion 360 to make a handphone stand.

Part 1: Designing a Keychain     [18/10/2021

Step 1: Selecting Top plane and New Sketch.

Figure 1: Empty Plane

Step 2: Use 2-point Rectangle and sketch out a rectangle of 65mmx25mm.

Figure 2: Sketch of Rectangle

Step 3: Use Filet to round out the edges to 5mm.

Figure 3: Filet edges

Step 4: Add a construction line and place it 7mm away from the left edge.

Figure 4: Construction line

Step 5: Add a Circle of 5mm at the center of the keychain. When a triangle appears, it means that it is centered.

Figure 5: Sketch a Circle 

Step 6: Add Text onto the keychain. Once done, Extrude the base by 3mm and the text by 2mm, and your keychain is done!

 
 

Reflection

This keychain activity served as a very good refresher after not touching Fusion for many weeks. Initially, I struggled a little as I had forgotten many of the different functions that Fusion has to offer and eventually, I got the hang of it. This activity helped me struggle less when doing the Handphone Stand which is in Part 2.

Part 2: Designing a Handphone Stand     [25/10/2021]

Step 1: Firstly, I went to search for a design that intrigued me on the Web. I found this design, however, it is difficult for me to draw the man on Fusion 360. I found this video on Youtube teaching how to convert any image to models on Fusion 360. [https://youtu.be/s0stI95C5Pc]

Figure 1: Design Idea

Step 2: Following the video, I used GIMP software to make the image black and white using their threshold function.

Figure 2: Making of black and white image

Step 3: I then exported the image onto InkScape to convert the Raster image to a Vector image by using the Trace Bitmap function.

Figure 3: Converting image to Vector

Figure 4: Comparison of Raster vs Vector Image

Step 4: Now, I'm ready to edit the sketch on Fusion 360. I inserted the image as an SVG file onto Fusion 360 and scaled it to an appropriate size of around 100mm by 100mm.

Figure 5: Image on Fusion 360

Step 5: I decided to use 2 parameters - "joint" and "diameter" by selecting Modify and then Change Parameters. This allows me to easily change the dimensions easily.

Figure 6: Parameters

Step 6: I added a joint at the leg of the man so that it can be attached to the base. I did it by using a Center Rectangle and I used the "joint" parameter for the dimensions.

Figure 7: Joint 

Step 7: For the base, I used a Center Diameter Circle with the diameter as the parameter "diameter". I then used the Center Rectangle to draw the connection part for the man and a stand to support the phone. I used "joint" mm for the connection part and as for the stand I used "diameter/2" mm for the length and 5mm for the width.

Figure 8: Drawing the Base

Step 8: Next, I extruded the man by "joint" mm. For the base, I extruded it by "joint+3" mm and the stand by "joint+8" mm.

Figure 9: Extruded Bodies

Step 9: By selecting each body and right-clicking it, I can change it to a component. This allows me to assemble the 2 bodies together using the Joint function and I can view the finished product to see if it looks fine. This allowed me to make necessary changes to the design.

Figure 10: Finished product

Reflection

From the Handphone stand exercise, I discovered many new features that I never knew existed, such as the parametric and the joint function. It was not easy to use these functions at first and I had to search for many Youtube videos to guide me as well as ask for help from my classmates. It was definitely a challenge especially after not using Fusion 360 for many weeks. I'm sure that after a few more designs I will be exposed to more interesting Fusion functions and be more proficient at it. This activity was very engaging and allowed me to express my creativity through my interests and I hope in the future I'm able to use Fusion 360 to design things for my own personal use!