Working with a Support

This task shows how to create a support. It may be either a plane or a surface.
This will allow you to automatically reference a surface or plane as the supporting element whenever you need one, when creating Lines for example. You will no longer have to explicitly select the support element.
It will also allow you to create reference points on the fly on the support, whenever you need a reference point to create other geometric elements.

Open the WorkOnSupport1.CATPart document.

Creating a support from a surface

  1. Click the Work on Support icon  .

The Work on Support dialog box appears.

  1. Select the surface to be used as support element.

If a plane is selected, a grid is displayed to facilitate visualization.

  1. Select a point.

By default the surface's midpoint is selected.

  1. Click OK in the dialog box. 

The element (identified as WorkingSupport.xxx) is added to the specification tree.

  1. Click the Point icon  I_PointP2.gif (94 bytes).

The Point definition dialog box is displayed. The Reference Point field is automatically filled in with the point selected when defining the currently active working support.

Creating a support from a plane

  1. Click the Work on Support icon  .

  1. Select the plane to be used as support element.

The Work on Support dialog box is displayed, allowing you to define the plane:

By default, the Grid type is set to Cartesian, to define a Cartesian plane.

A grid can also be displayed to facilitate visualization. You can hide it by checking the Hide grid option.

  1. Select a point, as the support plane's origin.
By default the plane's origin is selected. Beware of the plane representation not being located at the plane's origin. In this case, the default point, really is displayed at the origin and therefore not necessarily onto the plane representation.

  1. Define the First direction scale (H for horizontal), by setting Primary spacing and Graduations values.

  2. If needed, select a direction to specify the H direction.
    You can right-click in the editable field to display the contextual menu and define the direction (by defining its vector, creating a line, and so forth).

  3. If you wish, you can define another scale for the Second direction scale (V for vertical), thus allowing distortions of the grid. Check the Allow distortions option to activate the Primary spacing and Graduations fields of the second direction.

  4. Check the Shade grid plane option to visualize the support plane as a solid geometric element.
    This is possible only if the View mode is adequate.

  5. Check the Position grid plane parallel to screen to reset the grid visualization parallel to the screen.

  1. Click OK in the dialog box. 

    The element (identified as WorkingSupport.xxx) is added to the specification tree.

By default the last created working support is displayed in red in the specification tree.
Use the Set As Current/Set As Not Current contextual menu, or the  Working Supports Activity icon, to define which is the default current support that will be automatically selected when entering a command that requires a working support.
Regardless of the type of working support created (surface or plane) once you choose to work on the support, you can directly click onto the support to create points. This capability is available with commands such as point, line, spline, polyline, and most commands where you need to select points as inputs.
Working supports can be edited, updated, or deleted just as any other feature.
Click the Snap to point icon to snap the point being created onto the nearest intersection point on the grid.

 
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