Surfacing – Where Do I Start?

Charles Culp, Aerospace Design Engineer

Essex Industries
Meet Charles

Charles Culp
• CSWP
• Design Engineer
• Essex Industries
• This is my third SolidWorks World
• I design ergonomic flight controls
for aircraft.

• charles@charlesculp.com
• twitter.com/charlesculp
• forum.solidworks.com/community/
solidworks/surfacing
Examples of My Work
Topics for Today

• Thinking in Surfaces
• Curvature and Why it is Important
• Which Tool To Use
• Example Model
Setup

• Settings that I like:

− RealView On w/Car Paint
Primary Surface Tools

• Tools that create surfaces from sketches (or edges)

 Extrude Surface
 Revolved Surface
 Swept Surface
 Lofted Surface (I never use this, use Boundary)
 Planar Surface (I never use this, use Fill instead)
 Boundary Surface
 Filled Surface
 Ruled Surface
 Radiate Surface (I never use this, use Ruled with Perp. to Vector)
Introduction to Fill

• Fill is:
 Used for 2 or 3 sided faces
 5 or more sided faces
 Best build by controlling the tangencies tightly
− Helper surfaces should be used on open edges

 Less explicit than Boundary

 More prone to mountains and valleys
Introduction to Boundary

• Use Boundary, not Loft

− Loft with the centerline option is useful, otherwise Boundary does everything Loft does,
but better.
− Boundary allows for full curvature control and path control in both directions
− Boundary can be made from a cross shape, and is direction neutral

• Boundary is the primary tool for curvy surface creation

• The first feature of every surface model I create is a Boundary Surfaceselec
• Use the selection manager, you
can use one sketch or many
• You can use any number of lines
or sketches, the one-to-one myth
is easily overcome with connectors
Introduction to Ruled Surface

• Ruled Surfaces
 Can do most things extrude surface can, but
without a sketch
 Tangent to surface, normal to surface, tapered to
vector (draft), perpendicular to vector (radiate
surface), Sweep (sweep using the edge as the
path)
 I use it less frequently than others, but it is still
useful
Secondary Surfacing Tools

• Secondary Tools are those that modify an existing surface

 Offset Surface
 Delete Face
 Replace Face
 Extend Surface
 Trim Surface
 Untrim Surface
 Face Fillet
 Delete Hole
 Knit Surface
 Thicken
 Split Line
Secondary Surfacing Tools

 Trim is the most common

− I typically avoid mutual trim as SolidWorks often forgets which
side to keep and which to trim
− Since I try to overextend surfaces, trim is then very often used to
trim them back down

 Offset surface
− Used for thickening when more features are needed first, or for
thickening complex shapes
− Also key to thinking in surfaces; use offset surfaces instead of a
dimensioned line

 Delete Face
− Pretty self explanatory, except it is also used to convert a solid
body into a surface body.
− It can also be used to automatically delete and patch, or delete
and fill

 Knit Surface
− Connects multiple surface faces into surface bodies
− Converts a fully enclosed set of surfaces into a solid body
Secondary Surfacing Tools

 Extend
− Improved in 2010, still unpredictable

 Untrim
− Magic! Uses information inside every surface to
extend up to the entire patch (think filled surface tool
preview). Great for deleting holes, and much more
predictable than extend. Of course, it can only
extend if the underlying patch data is already there.

 Face Fillet
− Works better than regular fillet. It works more often
when used with faces (no pesky ends), often works
better with larger radii.
− Curvature Continuous Option is great, automated
blends
Creating Sketches

• I never use Composite, Projected, or

XYZ Curves. Ever.
• Use extruded surfaces instead of
projected curves
• Use Splines instead of composite
curves
Why Model 100% Curvature Continuous

• Because that makes it possible to

add features later & maintain
curvature.
 Sometimes! Note the last
barrel fill is not actually
curvature continuous. It
probably just needs more
work.
Thinking in Surfaces

• Always start with what you know

• It is ok to eyeball
• Keep things unconstrained, my surface model
sketches are not all black
• Build with the edges in mind, think of the
wireframe of the part
• Build your wireframe around any areas of
symmetry
• Think of the part as a silhouette, and sketch
that profile
• Create Boundary Surfaces as the base
• Fill in gaps with the fill surface
• Use extrude and ruled surface for any flat or
single direction of curvature faces
An Example

• Lets review a simple surface model I built; a

handle grip.
Use Filled Surface For Easy Closed Transitions

This frame is also part of my advanced surfacing class I gave on Monday.

Why include it here, too? Because I think it is that important.

• Most of my transitions are done

this way
• Key to “thinking in surfaces”
• Even a novice or non-surfacing
expert can learn this technique to
make their models better
Still Stumped?

• Books:
 SolidWorks Surfacing and Complex Shape Modeling Bible –
SolidWorks 2008; by Matt Lombard
 SolidWorks Surfacing Bible – 2011 (Coming late this summer)

• Online Information:
 Ed Eaton’s Curvy Stuff:
http://www.dimontegroup.com/Tutori
als/SolidWorks_Tutorials.htm
 Mark Biasotti’s Modeling 301:
http://files.solidworks.com/special-
videos/advanced-modeling-301-
mab.zip
 Matthew Perez speaker:
http://ola2.aacc.edu/tmcallinan/ENT2
80/Complex%20Surfacing-
Speaker.pdf
 Matthew Perez Camaro:
https://forum.solidworks.com/thread/
37350
Further Studies

• Three part Razor demo:

http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/advanced-modeling-demo-part1.swf
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/advanced-modeling-demo-part2.swf
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/advanced-modeling-demo-part3.swf
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/razor-mm.zip
• Boat Hull Demo:
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/boathull-using-freeform.wmv
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/boathull-using-freeform.zip
• Game Controller Model:
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/gamecontroller.zip
• Boundary Surface Spoon Demo:
http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/boundary-feature.wmv
• Miscel:
 http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/getting around project curve
constraint problem.avi
 http://files.solidworks.com/special-videos/applying a face tangent
constraint.avi
 http://www.solidworks.com/sw/support/subscription/SolidWorksTipsandTr
icksArchives.html