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  #11  
Old 02-23-2010, 03:28 PM
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The Scale

And now I'm going to describe the steps of this process of design and construction, showing the general methodologies, strategies for organizing work, and the tricks to avoid the biggest problems. I will not go into details of the design and development of each individual component because it's too long, but I will give an indication of where to find the information for further study, where possible.

At the very beginning, I chose Pepakura to obtain flat surfaces from the 3D model: because of that I decided to exploit the possibility of using the manual way to unfold, by defining the maximum height of the final model.

In the drawing, that I decided to use, there is a scale reference bar, which indicates the actual size of three meters (I suppose). So I brought in Sketchup the image size so that the bar reference measured three meters also in the drawing. Then I created two copies of the drawing and I placed them squarely.



I chose the scale 1 / 33, so what in the model is 10 cm high, in the drawing (reality) is 330 cm high. That is why in all my drawings there will be a box 330 cm tall as a reference.



Then in Pepakura, to Unfold the model, you have to uncheck the option "Auto" next to the button "Unfold", and in the panel "Parts Layout" and to set to 100 mm the Height in the "assembled size" frame. Obviously in the design we have to put no part of the model higher than 330 cm!

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  #12  
Old 02-23-2010, 03:31 PM
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Thickness

Before starting with the design we should define the thickness of the materials that we intend to use in the building process, to be sure that, when we go to assemble, all the parts fit perfectly.

So I took 10 small pieces of paper that I then used (160 g/m2) and I measured the thickness of the stack. The same with one small piece of cardboard. With these measures, I calculated the thickness that would have in reality for a given scale, and I then used that measure in the sizing of the parts in the drawing. Remember that we design the model in SketchUp at actual size!



So, in the drawing, the paper will be about 0.5 cm thick and the cardboard about 1.5 cm.

Now we have the plan, the scale, the thickness, and we can start by drawing the parties.

....... To be continued
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  #13  
Old 02-23-2010, 03:36 PM
cmdr199212 cmdr199212 is offline
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wow. I'm stunned. Your work is very good, especially considering that it designed using (for the most part) free programs. Excellent work!
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  #14  
Old 02-23-2010, 03:52 PM
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Vamos Nando !!! You can do it. As I've said in the original thread the effort to translate the instrucions from to another software was great.
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  #15  
Old 02-26-2010, 04:11 PM
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Groups / Components

Before I show a way to design a model I’d like to highlight a fundamental concept in Sketchup.

The magic word with SketchUp is GROUP.
Each group is independent and the drawn objects (lines, circles, rectangles, etc..) remain separated from the surface of the objects in the group.
So we have to organize our project into groups (components), to split the complexity of the project in more simple and manageable subsets (eg, fuselage, tail, gear, wings, etc..). To keep track of the organization of the model is useful to visualize the window of the structure (outliner).

Here we can hide / display, lock / unlock, select / deselect, rename, rearrange the hierarchy and ultimately save the components as separate projects.

The ability to save individual parts as separate projects is extremely useful. When we have designed the model geometry, we could
then work on individual sub-projects to develope their unfold in Pepakura and to apply textures.

When we completed a component (unfold & texture), we can import the new component in the model, substituting the old version.

Below is an example of an organization of the model and an example of the directories where I stored the files of the sub projects.

Further below is an example of a sub-project (the engine) how has been exported from the model on the left and then completed and ready to be imported back into the model on the right.





The Groups and Components are useful also because you can unfold and print the single sub project and test if everything fits good.



Then You can assemble the unfolded parts, any way you want, in the final version of your model.



Finally I imported the last version of the component in the sketchup model.
A hint: It’s a good practice to name in a different manner each version of the component, at less before you import it in the model,
for distinguish it from the original one, but if you want to maintain the same name you have first to purge the unused versions in the
model, selecting in the window menu the model information and then the statistics. Otherwise apparently you cannot import the last
version, because sketchup keeps memory of the previous version deleted.
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  #16  
Old 02-26-2010, 04:16 PM
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Process Summary

Now I can summarize the process to design, unfold and build the model step by step.

  1. design the general geometry
  2. Define the Groups and Components
  3. Work on the subprojects for refine and for engineer the geometry
  4. test to unfold the single component, if necessary return at the previous step (3.)
  5. test build the unfolded component, if necessary return at refining the project (3.)
  6. apply a texture and colorize the component
  7. unfold and build the component
  8. put the unfolded component in the general model sheet
  9. return to work at next subproject until the model will be complete (3.)

The first two steps actually are contextual, because while I was designing one part of the model, at the same time I had in mind that this one could become a component.

I choose the Roman’s model, not only because I would to follow approximately the steps of his book, but also because in this manner I could avoid “to invent the whell again”, as in Italy we say. Not only the geometry of he model is simple (no much curved surfaces) but Roman already solved the problem of how to decompose the model.

I therefore advise you to carefully choose the model to test this technique, so as not to overlap the difficulty of learning the tools with the difficulty of designing.

Best, Nando

... and tomorrow: Drawing the fuselage :D
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  #17  
Old 02-26-2010, 04:20 PM
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Drawing the fuselage

I can start now by showing how to draw the fuselage, at less the rear part of the fuselage.

This part is simple, into this I have to put some bulkhead and finally I have to colorize it and put on it the nationality mark. With one component I can summarize a lot of techniques.

Let's go!!

I start drawing some line on the surface of the TopView to score the width of the fuselage at the major points. The TopView is a group so the lines are free from the surface.



Then I hide the TopView and I move and copy the lines I drawn to score the major points on the SideView. The SideView is also a
Group so ….



Now I can join the extremities of the lines to build the flat surface of the fuselage.


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  #18  
Old 02-26-2010, 04:23 PM
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Drawing the fuselage - 2

I hid the SideView and I grouped the lines and the surface that I drawn. Then I created a copy of the group, I mirrored it, and finally I grouped the two copies together.




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  #19  
Old 02-26-2010, 04:28 PM
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Drawing the fuselage - 3

Then I drawn two lines (blue) to score the height of the upper curved surface of the fuselage on the SideView, and I used those lines to draw two arcs.




Then I used the “Push/Pull” tool onto major arc to create the upper surface as a solid. Next I used the “Scale” tool to fit the width, then the “Move” tool to fold the small extremity, and the “Scale” again to reduce the height of the arc. Use the inference!






Now I can clean the surface from the useless elements and create a group.

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Current Apollo CM 1-24
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  #20  
Old 02-26-2010, 04:36 PM
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Drawing the fuselage - 4

The final part of the fuselage allows us to show how to trim a part.
First I draw the shape (the half) on the TopView and then I pulled and grouped it.




Now I drawn a rectangle, I grouped it, I rotated It against the lower surface of the fuselage. Now I can modify the group of the end of the fuselage, intersecting it with the model. So we can delete the lower part of the shape (the selected one).





I exploded the group and copied the upper and lower edges, and I used those lines to make the upper and lower surface. I grouped the single surfaces and all togheter. At last the fuselage completed.





Wow! It's enough for tonight ... Tomorrow Bulkheads :D

Best, Nando
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