Lack of Talent : Need modelling help

[Ky Lane]

Hi guys,

 

Hoping you can offer me some ideas here. Im at the limit of my modelling talent, and have some issues I need to sort out.

 

Ive been supplied a model of a vehicle from a client from SolidWorks. Now, Ive had to export each individual piece of the model as a STL file to bring into Max (all 380+ of them). In doing so, there are just a few objects which seem to have 2 curved faces very close to each other, and as a result of triangulating the surfaces, I have intersecting verticies etc, causing ugly rendering issues.

 

Ive tried a few techniques to export it with more/less detail, and using Xview to try and fit the offending polys, but its just a mess. Ive resided that its just going to be easier to re-model these 4 peices so theyre 100% correct.

 

You'll see what I mean in the image. Theyre seem pretty non-descript to look at, but Ive tried, and cant get them seamless to the surfaces around them. Its killing me!

 

Any advise appreciated.

[Dave Buckley]

will solidworks not export a sat file so that it imports as max body objects, that way t should look exactly how it did in solidworks?

 

this is how i've worked with inventor in the past and aren't solidworks and invenor identical apart from manufacturer

[Ky Lane]

Gday Dave

 

Unsure, Ill try - but just exporting it from SW tends to triangulate curves which cause the issues.

 

Ive asked the OS cad operator to remove the back faces for me, but there is a major language barrier involved - so Im not holding my breath.

 

I know little to nothing about SolidWorks - nor, now having used it, desire to.

[Dave Buckley]

yeh the sat format retains the curve network of the original model so give it a try, it should eliminate your problem

[chadw]

make sure you are exporting with normals as well. Based on the image provided it appears you have blown normals which will give you all sorts of rendering nastiness

[Claudio Branch]

 

Any advise appreciated.

 

 

My advice is that you you use surface modeling to solve this problem. If you are not familiar with surface modeling techniques, then just look it up in Max's User Help or on-line.

 

It is really pretty straight forward stuff and extremely useful. I used my trusty eyeball method and came up with this inside of 30 minutes:

[Ky Lane]

Thanks guys, will try exporting from SolidWorks this morning - and thanks for taking the time Claudio - that will def be my fallback.

[Ky Lane]

After importing the SAT file, the plugin which imports them (nPowers PowerNURBS) says its a demo only, please insert US$995.

[Justin Hunt]

I though Max2011 imported SAT files,

 

jhv

[Ky Lane]

I though Max2011 imported SAT files,

 

jhv

 

Im still stuck in 2010 land

[Dave Buckley]

yeh sorry i should have checked, if you've got max 2010 on subs then get yourself to the subs center and download the connection extension, that will do it, thats basically what has been integrated into max 2011.

 

or, not sure if this will work but . . . download max 2011 trial, import sat file, then use the save to previous feature to save it back to 2010. you may still need the connection extension though so that it recognises the body objects. worth a try though

[Ky Lane]

yeh sorry i should have checked, if you've got max 2010 on subs then get yourself to the subs center and download the connection extension, that will do it, thats basically what has been integrated into max 2011.

 

or, not sure if this will work but . . . download max 2011 trial, import sat file, then use the save to previous feature to save it back to 2010. you may still need the connection extension though so that it recognises the body objects. worth a try though

 

All good thanks mate, JHV was my saviour (as usual) and helped me out by converting the whole model over for me. Just a couple niggling issues with the model, but Im nearly done.

[Dave Buckley]

good to hear

[Justin Hunt]

my pleasure

 

Looking good

 

jhv