How to make 3d rotary objects(even in VCarve)
Have you ever wanted to make a custom 3D rotary project? This video will show you how with VCarve or Aspire!
Want to learn more??
Click the link below to take your Vectric skills to the next level!
Video Transcript:
Hello everyone in this video answering a student's question on how to make custom rotary objects like you see here. So this one he's trying to create custom three dimensional knobs, and I show how to do this in Aspire and in VCarve. And these are done with very simple two dimensional shapes. And then we turn those into 3D in Aspire. And then after that, I also show you how to do it in VCarve if you do not have Aspire. So let's get started and create a new project, do Rotary. We'll do a four inch diameter. So I always recommend to zero off the cylinder axis in the center. You can go wherever you want in the x, y as you go off one of the left corners is fine. And I'm going to go along the X, but if you need to change that, you can click okay. So if we take I was going to do a circle
but would just say if we took a circle, say, three and a half inches we’ll do it. If you need an oval, you can make an oval too. But I'm just going to show you like a real quick explanation how the process works and then you can just adjust this side of that shape to whatever you need. But then the bottom, you can draw that something like this.
Yes, there is doing this a rough sketch here. And then we'll take these two shapes and I'm going to center them. See my shapes off a little. So I'm going to move it up center. That is not perfect, but you get the idea. Here you have these two shapes, and then you can select them, too.
And well done. And you actually should already have a shape that looks like this. And then what we'll do is go to the node edit mode by selecting click the letter N. And at the top we already have a node in the center. At the bottom we need the node in the center. So just right click on that bottom line. Don't click on the center, right click off
center of it and click Insert midpoint that will insert a node right there and then you can right click on that node and cut the vector at the bottom and at the top. Cut, cut, and then delete the bottom half and then that will be blue with half of the shape. So you already have the shape drawn. What I would do is copy the shape and then split in half that way.
You still have the original if you need it for something. Okay, From here, if you have Aspire, you can turn this into a 3D model and then you would just do a 3D toolpath for this. If you have V Carve, then you can use the molding toolpath for this. I can show you both ways that trick already will create these rails on the sides here for using this for this exact thing you're trying to do. So since this is smaller, what you could do is grab this rail, hold shift, select your shape. Just make sure it's wherever you need it. I'm going to center it in the project. I mean, it's like this rail weld shift. Select the shape having to use the alignment tool to line to the left edge. So there you go. That just moved that line. I'm going to select the line on the right called Shift. Select our shape, and this time we're going to align it to the right side. And there we go.
Now we have our rails lined up with our shape. So if you want to do an Aspire when to split our view so you can see both sides, you know, you're going to go to the model tab, you're going to use the two rail sweep tool, which is the second one you're going to select both of those rails
will then shift, click, use selection, and then select your half of your shape there and then click apply. And you'll see in the 3D view, that's all it takes. And then from here you can do whatever else you want to do to it. And I also would add some type of tabs on the sides to hold it cutting free. So I could just do this in the Rotary Project, actually. Yes.
And to add those tableaus have to do there's already going to be a zero plane there. Just double click on that zero plane and give it some base site. And you see as you add base side to that, it's going to add sort of a tab there to hold your part. Just keep in mind it's set to the add combine mode. So right now is actually making the part bigger as well. Oh, and you want to both switch to merge. So merge that zero plane and right click on the component one and switch that to merge and that will keep the original size there. And there you go. Now you're ready to create some 3D toolbars. Kyle I would only add another one to that center pole that you had. It's like 211 pole. Yeah, you could do that. I going to do is take this shape that we just created. You can just move it
over, just slide it over here, keep it centered on your project. So that moved it on the side there. And then if you hold the control and the alt key and drag it to the right, that's going to make a copy and keep it straight aligned. And you see there you go. And I got to Oh, that's pretty cool. Now, pretty simple two at the same time. And actually what I would do for that is mirror this one. Don't want to copy. I want to actually I'm going to delete that copy. Take the first one we made, go to the mirror tool. I'm going to create a mirror copy. I'm going to flip it to the right. And what that does was will keep that spot there. So you're not cutting real deep in between them. But I would make it probably a little bit wider like the width of a blade or something if you want to cut it off later. How do you want to do that? You can decide, but just to keep it from plunging deep. See if you have that gap in between.
You're going to be plunging deep in there. Unless, of course, you make the this piece a little bit bigger omega zero plane, you can make a separate shape inside of there, bigger to make that part bigger and then not affect the outside as and as well. What's that split running through the middle will that show up when it's carved out or. Yeah that might be because right there you see I didn't align that properly when I moved it that that little gap there so we have to do is just select that use the alignment tool and align it top to bottom and that will close that gap up. Now there is a seam there because that's just where joins, but it will not carve that seam. Which tools do you recommend for that pile
and then mill and then a ball knows the finish header. Yeah you kind of soil you can use that mill for the roughing stage and then a bonus to finish it up. Or you can just use a ball nose to do the roughing and finishing. You won't need a very detailed bonus for this. You can probably get away with a quarter inch knows the only problem area will be in this area right here. But if you take a circle that is a quarter inch in diameter, you can see what that would look like carving that area there. This will be your quarter inch Bono's and you'll see that's how close it'll get to that corner. So if you want a more detail than that,
then you'd have to use a smaller ball notice. But as our detail, you want that part right there. Oh I see. Okay. You can also use the rest machining to carve that with a smaller ball nose and carve the rest with the larger one. So just isolate that one area, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
If you want to just add a filler in there, if you don't want that sharp corner, you could do that as well and for you could be carve users. I'll show you guys if you, if I hide all those 3D components and just go to the toolbar tab, you would draw all those shapes we looked at earlier
and go to the molding to a path, select the two rails and hold shift.
Actually, sorry, not two rails. You only want to select one rail, then hold shift, select the shape that you want to put on those rail on that rail to a pat position you want to most likely you're going to want to put the gap at the bottom or sorry, the gap both. That way. Your part stay stays the exact size you want it. If this was a two inch diameter shape, you could see it's the cut depth is two inches. So it's two inches for half of the shape. So that'll give you a four inch total shape at the end. And then you're going to select your tool. So you can say we want to do a quarter inch ball, nose will do quarter inch. Those select you can use a larger clearance tool. This will be like the roughing stage if you want you. I would recommend that in this shape because there are some deep areas and you can also select the same tool to do the roughing as well. And you could change the step over on that. I would select the tool and then click, edit and change it, step over to more like 40%. So carves a little quicker and then you can ramp the plunge, moves. And I like to leave a point zero for machining allowance and then click calculate and you see that shape is in there. We have two toolbars. This first one is the roughing stage, the second one is the finishing stage and see if we preview the roughing preview visible. It's going to preview flat first
and then it's going to wrap it. So we did have very step over selected.
So it actually went a little smoother than 40%. So if you didn't want that 40%, you can adjust that. Also, you take notice it is carving very deep in these areas. To fix that, All you have to do is go back to your drawing tools. I actually don't need this slide on the side here. I always have to use. Take a line wherever you want to stop it. Let's say we want to stop it right here, just out of line there and then use the scissor tool and trim that like that. So now to carve and come down to this level and stop there, you could do the same thing at the top if you wanted to add a little joint bit there and then trim there and there and there you go. And then you adjust your top path for that. But you also want to make sure your heart ends up the same size. So it's actually better you take this line. I just undid that trim there. If you take this line and align it to the bottom, towards the bottom of that half circle
and then select that line and use the move tool. And this time we can move an exact distance. So if we wanted a one inch part holding at the top, we would move that half. So we would do a relative move half inch
click, apply. So now this will be a half inch of material on the bottom.
But since this is half of our shape, I mean that would be a one inch total. So if I use a scissors, trim that. Now if I go back to our toolbar, just keep in mind this sweep line will have to be adjusted as well if you want that in the same location. So just select that sweep line, select the shape and align it to the left edge. So it just moved out to that new line. Now the toolbar, they're going to double click on that two paths to edit and select that rail and then hold shift,
select our profile shape. And this time the gap below will be the exact gap that we move that line, which in this case was a half edge. So that will leave us with a the exact size part at the end. You can see now the cut depth is 1.5 inches because we took a half inch off the bottom of the shape. So now the height of the shape is 1.5 and then we're going to have an additional half inch gap below that which would leave us with a total of two inches, just like we had before. If we leave all the other settings the same together, you want to take notice of the boundary offset. It'd be good to leave it at zero for this so it does not go past
these edges of the lines there. So now we could calculate,
reset the preview and preview visible or selected rather. And this time it will leave us with more meat on the ends where it's not cutting that part free. You can see There we go. Now we have a lot more. We have a one inch diameter at the front and whatever we left up at the end on the side and then the second toolpath will be the finishing part of it. The preview that and that's actually the one we changed the step over for
it looks like. Edit that. Yep, that should be 8% or the tool in a larger clearance tool. Okay. I just had the wrong step over there. Larger clearance tool should be 40%. The regular tool should be eight. Recalculate that, that should cut it much quicker. So now a preview of that again. There we go. There's the roughing stage. So got a bit spaced out farther, which is okay. And then the finishing will be a lot cleaner. Smoothing that out. And there you go. And that actually might cut faster than the 3D toolbar. Sometimes you have to play around with those too.
This sometimes will cut faster than doing it in 3D. The only benefit of doing in 3D is if you wanted to add like additional 3D objects on top of this, you wouldn't be able to do that as easily. With V Carve, you can draw some text that would only be for the spire because you have to project that onto the 3D model with that option down the bottom.
But technically this is not a 3D model, this is just a toolpath So that option will only work for Aspire.
That's all for this video. Make sure you like and subscribe for more and if you want to master your Vectric
software, make sure you check out my Vectric training classes linked
right here where we go much more in depth. How to use the Vectric software step by step and included with my training courses is weekly
Q&A course, where I answer your questions one on one and get the support you need. And if you want to watch another great Vectric tip, check out this video posted right here.
but would just say if we took a circle, say, three and a half inches we’ll do it. If you need an oval, you can make an oval too. But I'm just going to show you like a real quick explanation how the process works and then you can just adjust this side of that shape to whatever you need. But then the bottom, you can draw that something like this.
Yes, there is doing this a rough sketch here. And then we'll take these two shapes and I'm going to center them. See my shapes off a little. So I'm going to move it up center. That is not perfect, but you get the idea. Here you have these two shapes, and then you can select them, too.
And well done. And you actually should already have a shape that looks like this. And then what we'll do is go to the node edit mode by selecting click the letter N. And at the top we already have a node in the center. At the bottom we need the node in the center. So just right click on that bottom line. Don't click on the center, right click off
center of it and click Insert midpoint that will insert a node right there and then you can right click on that node and cut the vector at the bottom and at the top. Cut, cut, and then delete the bottom half and then that will be blue with half of the shape. So you already have the shape drawn. What I would do is copy the shape and then split in half that way.
You still have the original if you need it for something. Okay, From here, if you have Aspire, you can turn this into a 3D model and then you would just do a 3D toolpath for this. If you have V Carve, then you can use the molding toolpath for this. I can show you both ways that trick already will create these rails on the sides here for using this for this exact thing you're trying to do. So since this is smaller, what you could do is grab this rail, hold shift, select your shape. Just make sure it's wherever you need it. I'm going to center it in the project. I mean, it's like this rail weld shift. Select the shape having to use the alignment tool to line to the left edge. So there you go. That just moved that line. I'm going to select the line on the right called Shift. Select our shape, and this time we're going to align it to the right side. And there we go.
Now we have our rails lined up with our shape. So if you want to do an Aspire when to split our view so you can see both sides, you know, you're going to go to the model tab, you're going to use the two rail sweep tool, which is the second one you're going to select both of those rails
will then shift, click, use selection, and then select your half of your shape there and then click apply. And you'll see in the 3D view, that's all it takes. And then from here you can do whatever else you want to do to it. And I also would add some type of tabs on the sides to hold it cutting free. So I could just do this in the Rotary Project, actually. Yes.
And to add those tableaus have to do there's already going to be a zero plane there. Just double click on that zero plane and give it some base site. And you see as you add base side to that, it's going to add sort of a tab there to hold your part. Just keep in mind it's set to the add combine mode. So right now is actually making the part bigger as well. Oh, and you want to both switch to merge. So merge that zero plane and right click on the component one and switch that to merge and that will keep the original size there. And there you go. Now you're ready to create some 3D toolbars. Kyle I would only add another one to that center pole that you had. It's like 211 pole. Yeah, you could do that. I going to do is take this shape that we just created. You can just move it
over, just slide it over here, keep it centered on your project. So that moved it on the side there. And then if you hold the control and the alt key and drag it to the right, that's going to make a copy and keep it straight aligned. And you see there you go. And I got to Oh, that's pretty cool. Now, pretty simple two at the same time. And actually what I would do for that is mirror this one. Don't want to copy. I want to actually I'm going to delete that copy. Take the first one we made, go to the mirror tool. I'm going to create a mirror copy. I'm going to flip it to the right. And what that does was will keep that spot there. So you're not cutting real deep in between them. But I would make it probably a little bit wider like the width of a blade or something if you want to cut it off later. How do you want to do that? You can decide, but just to keep it from plunging deep. See if you have that gap in between.
You're going to be plunging deep in there. Unless, of course, you make the this piece a little bit bigger omega zero plane, you can make a separate shape inside of there, bigger to make that part bigger and then not affect the outside as and as well. What's that split running through the middle will that show up when it's carved out or. Yeah that might be because right there you see I didn't align that properly when I moved it that that little gap there so we have to do is just select that use the alignment tool and align it top to bottom and that will close that gap up. Now there is a seam there because that's just where joins, but it will not carve that seam. Which tools do you recommend for that pile
and then mill and then a ball knows the finish header. Yeah you kind of soil you can use that mill for the roughing stage and then a bonus to finish it up. Or you can just use a ball nose to do the roughing and finishing. You won't need a very detailed bonus for this. You can probably get away with a quarter inch knows the only problem area will be in this area right here. But if you take a circle that is a quarter inch in diameter, you can see what that would look like carving that area there. This will be your quarter inch Bono's and you'll see that's how close it'll get to that corner. So if you want a more detail than that,
then you'd have to use a smaller ball notice. But as our detail, you want that part right there. Oh I see. Okay. You can also use the rest machining to carve that with a smaller ball nose and carve the rest with the larger one. So just isolate that one area, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
If you want to just add a filler in there, if you don't want that sharp corner, you could do that as well and for you could be carve users. I'll show you guys if you, if I hide all those 3D components and just go to the toolbar tab, you would draw all those shapes we looked at earlier
and go to the molding to a path, select the two rails and hold shift.
Actually, sorry, not two rails. You only want to select one rail, then hold shift, select the shape that you want to put on those rail on that rail to a pat position you want to most likely you're going to want to put the gap at the bottom or sorry, the gap both. That way. Your part stay stays the exact size you want it. If this was a two inch diameter shape, you could see it's the cut depth is two inches. So it's two inches for half of the shape. So that'll give you a four inch total shape at the end. And then you're going to select your tool. So you can say we want to do a quarter inch ball, nose will do quarter inch. Those select you can use a larger clearance tool. This will be like the roughing stage if you want you. I would recommend that in this shape because there are some deep areas and you can also select the same tool to do the roughing as well. And you could change the step over on that. I would select the tool and then click, edit and change it, step over to more like 40%. So carves a little quicker and then you can ramp the plunge, moves. And I like to leave a point zero for machining allowance and then click calculate and you see that shape is in there. We have two toolbars. This first one is the roughing stage, the second one is the finishing stage and see if we preview the roughing preview visible. It's going to preview flat first
and then it's going to wrap it. So we did have very step over selected.
So it actually went a little smoother than 40%. So if you didn't want that 40%, you can adjust that. Also, you take notice it is carving very deep in these areas. To fix that, All you have to do is go back to your drawing tools. I actually don't need this slide on the side here. I always have to use. Take a line wherever you want to stop it. Let's say we want to stop it right here, just out of line there and then use the scissor tool and trim that like that. So now to carve and come down to this level and stop there, you could do the same thing at the top if you wanted to add a little joint bit there and then trim there and there and there you go. And then you adjust your top path for that. But you also want to make sure your heart ends up the same size. So it's actually better you take this line. I just undid that trim there. If you take this line and align it to the bottom, towards the bottom of that half circle
and then select that line and use the move tool. And this time we can move an exact distance. So if we wanted a one inch part holding at the top, we would move that half. So we would do a relative move half inch
click, apply. So now this will be a half inch of material on the bottom.
But since this is half of our shape, I mean that would be a one inch total. So if I use a scissors, trim that. Now if I go back to our toolbar, just keep in mind this sweep line will have to be adjusted as well if you want that in the same location. So just select that sweep line, select the shape and align it to the left edge. So it just moved out to that new line. Now the toolbar, they're going to double click on that two paths to edit and select that rail and then hold shift,
select our profile shape. And this time the gap below will be the exact gap that we move that line, which in this case was a half edge. So that will leave us with a the exact size part at the end. You can see now the cut depth is 1.5 inches because we took a half inch off the bottom of the shape. So now the height of the shape is 1.5 and then we're going to have an additional half inch gap below that which would leave us with a total of two inches, just like we had before. If we leave all the other settings the same together, you want to take notice of the boundary offset. It'd be good to leave it at zero for this so it does not go past
these edges of the lines there. So now we could calculate,
reset the preview and preview visible or selected rather. And this time it will leave us with more meat on the ends where it's not cutting that part free. You can see There we go. Now we have a lot more. We have a one inch diameter at the front and whatever we left up at the end on the side and then the second toolpath will be the finishing part of it. The preview that and that's actually the one we changed the step over for
it looks like. Edit that. Yep, that should be 8% or the tool in a larger clearance tool. Okay. I just had the wrong step over there. Larger clearance tool should be 40%. The regular tool should be eight. Recalculate that, that should cut it much quicker. So now a preview of that again. There we go. There's the roughing stage. So got a bit spaced out farther, which is okay. And then the finishing will be a lot cleaner. Smoothing that out. And there you go. And that actually might cut faster than the 3D toolbar. Sometimes you have to play around with those too.
This sometimes will cut faster than doing it in 3D. The only benefit of doing in 3D is if you wanted to add like additional 3D objects on top of this, you wouldn't be able to do that as easily. With V Carve, you can draw some text that would only be for the spire because you have to project that onto the 3D model with that option down the bottom.
But technically this is not a 3D model, this is just a toolpath So that option will only work for Aspire.
That's all for this video. Make sure you like and subscribe for more and if you want to master your Vectric
software, make sure you check out my Vectric training classes linked
right here where we go much more in depth. How to use the Vectric software step by step and included with my training courses is weekly
Q&A course, where I answer your questions one on one and get the support you need. And if you want to watch another great Vectric tip, check out this video posted right here.
