Initial Capabilities - Sketcher Basics

In the first post I provided some of the background on why I have started Wildcat CAD.  In this post I want to outline what capabilities are currently available in Wildcat and what are the highest priority planned improvements.

2D sketching is pretty well supported at this point.  I have implemented the following 2D primitives:

• Conic Arc (both 2-point and 3-point)
• Circle (center-radius)
• Axis of revolution
• Conic section
• Ellipse
• Line
• Point
• Rectangle (resolves to 4 lines)

With these primitives I have been able to draft a wi

de variety of 2D sketch profiles.  Once you have drawn a sketch and exit back to 3D design (called Part Design Workbench) the sketch is automatically analyzed and Sketch Profiles are generated.  Below are two quick sample sketches I drew:

A Sketch Profile is an ordered series of 2D primitives that are connected by their end points.  Profiles can also be linear - no more than two primitives ever connect at a single end point.  They can also be open or closed - closed will separate the sketch into two portions, inside and out.  For doing something like a 3D extrude (called a Pad), a profile must be connected, linear, and closed.

Pretty much all of the 2D primitives are editable.  Just grab them and they can be moved around.  They will not stay connected to other primitives though.  That is a function of sketch constraints.  Constraints are not yet working, but a lot of the infrastructure is in place so hopefully they won't take took much longer.

If you want to try out making your own sketch, try following the Sketcher Tutorial.

Cheers,

Graham