Harpoon Designer

Description

The Harpoon Designer allows parts to be created in full 3D. Parts are designed by clicking and dragging the tube out from a harpoon style axis.

How To

Start Up

To access this designer, click the harpoon button on the start up page. This will open a new, blank part design.

Part Design

Once a new harpoon part design window has been opened, a new part can be created.

First, a die and material should be chosen. This can be done by clicking on the drop down menus next to the die and material icons in the top left corner of the screen.

If any cut-off is necessary, enter the amount needed into the start and end cut-off fields. The first/top field represents the cut-off at the start of the part and the second/bottom field represents the cut-off at the end of the part.

Now a part can be designed by clicking and dragging the tube from the harpoon axis. When a new part is opened, the harpoon will start out at the very center of the 3D axis, as shown to the right.

The harpoon has six different direction points. Each will pull the current straight length of the part in the chosen direction.

To start designing the part, click and drag one of the points in the desired direction. This can also be done by clicking the direction point and directly keying in the distance value or by entering values into the designer entry fields on the left.

As the part is being drawn, the lengths, angles and rotations will be automatically generated in the designer entry fields on the left of the screen. The value next to the ruler icon represents the length of the straight section before the currently selected bend. The values in the colored fields in the harpoon frame show how far and in which direction the current length of tube has been moved. See below for an example.

Controls and Options

To adjust the scale at which the part is being viewed in the part display, click either the large, medium, or small scale buttons . See images below for an explanation of each scale.

Notes can be attached to the part design project using the note button .

To add another bend to the part, click the add bend button .

The auto-zoom option can be turned on or off using the auto-zoom button . When activated, auto-zoom will zoom in or out to accommodate the size of the part. For example, if a length is originally 200 and is changed to 2000, it may extend past the part display's extend. Auto-zoom will zoom out to make sure the whole part is visible.

To completely start over and delete the whole part design, click the start over button .

To delete the last bend that was added to the part, click the delete bend button .