Book Image

Improving CAD Designs with Autodesk Fusion 360

By : Kevin Michael Land
Book Image

Improving CAD Designs with Autodesk Fusion 360

By: Kevin Michael Land

Overview of this book

Autodesk Fusion 360 has become an indispensable tool for designers, tinkerers, and engineers worldwide thanks to its versatility that allows for large-scale assemblies and smaller, quick 3D prints. If you’ve faced challenges with learning Fusion 360, this book will help you overcome them and build the confidence to design your own projects, explaining step-by-step instructions and the purpose of each tool. In this book, you’ll dive into the design workspace and learn sketching fundamentals such as setting up a component, recognizing when a sketch is fully constrained, and parametrically flexing models. Through trial and error, you’ll work on multiple easy-to-build projects to create simple, useful items that can be quickly 3D printed for use around the house and then advance to much bigger projects that require joint connectivity and large assemblies. By the end of this book, you’ll be able to sketch fully parametric designs, translate them into 3D models, and create your own unique designs.
Table of Contents (22 chapters)
1
Part 1: Simple, Fun Projects for Around the Home
7
Part 2: Bicycle Water Bottle Holder Project
13
Part 3: FORM Modeling Techniques
17
Part 4: Working with 2D and 3D Scanned Images

Surface tools

The surface tools are much like the form tools in that they work only with thin, non-solid geometry. There are many tools to use in this tab, but we will only use the PATCH tool for now and we will explore more in Chapter 12:

  1. Notice that we have a surface body since we did not close out the holes at the top and bottom. Click the Single View icon at the bottom of the screen to return to a single view from the multiple views.
  2. Click on the SURFACE tab at the top of the screen.
Figure 11.44 – The SURFACE tab location

Figure 11.44 – The SURFACE tab location

  1. Click on the CREATE drop-down arrow and click on the Patch tool.
Figure 11.45 – The Patch tool location

Figure 11.45 – The Patch tool location

  1. Orbit to view the bottom of the mouse and click on the edge. A preview of the flattened bottom will appear. Click OK to close the command.
Figure 11.46 – PATCH tool bottom face selection

Figure 11.46 – PATCH tool bottom face selection

  1. Click on the PATCH tool...