Modelling Parametric Multi size Toy Brick in FreeCAD Lattice WB | Part 2 of 2

Part 2 of 2: Making Toy bricks in FreeCAD which is fully parametric and configurable to any size and configuration 2x2, 2x3, 3x4 etc. Driven by a spreadsheet and using FreeCAD Lattice2 Workbench we create a Toy brick from a Technical Drawing which allows full customisation via a spreadsheet and is lightening fast. In the second part of the tutorial you will learn how to install the lattice 2 workbench and use the expressions and formula to repeat the features depending on the length and width units entered into the spreadsheet. You will learn how to make fast repeating patterns and finally prepare the finished model to allow for additional operations such as boolean cut and unions, whilst still keeping the parametric capabilities and allowing for export.

This is a two part video with

#FreeCAD , #CAD , #3D , #3DPrinting
Journey with me and

Patreon

Donate:

Subscribe:

Browse my Redbubble Shop:

[leroycasterline]

This video, along with Part 1, is one of your best lessons yet. I've learned so much I'll be able to use down the road. Thank you!

[gregwoolley]

Super excellent two part tutorial. i learned a lot. A big thank you!

[magnusflett]

A very useful pair of videos. I might be a retired engineer, but it is great to do some hands-on learning.

[JohnDoe-fvcu]

That's very good. Very professional. Even more than I was looking for. Having that flexibility means a lot for this kind of modeling. Thank you a lot for sharing this

[kenwendorf]

Thank you so very much for this great tutorial!! I have watched quite a few of yours and you do a great job, thank you. I followed along with this as well as part 1, however for the array -- instead of the "span" I used the "N-Step". That eliminated all the "length/width" equations. Instead I directly entered the stud spacing from the spread sheet. So much easier and cleaner.

[eddyproft]

Thank you so much for this awesome video! It helped me understand what is going on with the toy brick in Lesson 21 of your FreeCAD 0.20 For Beginners series.

[mariuszkuron]

I have learned something useful again. Thanks

[danilodasilvaborges]

Thank you very much. I'm learning a lot from you man.

[roofoofighter]

Great tutorial! Thanks 😊 Question- Can you set limits on spreadsheets cell values, for instance, only allow integers in a cell (no decimals) or a minimum/maximum value? Then there is no way to break things accidentally.

[andhemills]

This video got me what I wanted rather swiftly! (You're like the Biffa of FreeCAD)
Negative (-1) direction also reverses the array direction (reverse stayed false).
I think this lattice business isn't going to work for me. I created a 6x42 array of tubes to intersect an irregular shape. Sure, it looks nice. When i tried to slice the array using shape intersect, FC crashed.
I was able to slice the original part, but it didn't propagate throughout the array.
It crashed when I tried to use the Slice tool in Lattice2 also.
Another crash when I tried to convert the Arrays into a compound, then slice that.
I notice this error on load: 18:36:26 0 <App> Document.cpp(2843): Failed to restore Failed to parse expression.
...
And I'm back (5 hours later?). I ended up creating some 210 tubes without using the lattice. I was tempted to do some troubleshooting and file a bug, but I ended up looking into just copying the tube and repositioning each one.
Luckily, this video (series) did help and by the virtue of setting up the first tube and making it so I COULD use the arrays and in particular, using the spreadsheet for variable parameters helped. I suspect there's a better, easier way to do it, but maybe not. By placing formulas, I could change each position by (centerOffset * n), where I'd manually enter n for each tube 1-42. I couldn't get macros to help me. In the end, I checked the tubes held their parametrics, the only real value I was interested was their height or length, which I adjusted and they all changed! That felt good, even if I don't need to use it.
I still have to intersect each cube with the odd body, then flatten the curves that result, print them out, cut the templates, then wrap and cut the tubes.
It's fascinating how I'm "reverse engineering" this in VR in order to assemble it in reality.

[emmoemminghaus]

Great... but what if the units set to 1 by 1 ?

[ronnystandtke]

Wow, this is awesome! Could you add the model to the FreeCAD library?

[sjn]

So good explained. Thank you so much. Make fun to follow me. Thanks 🙂