Animated part keeps flipping it's orientation

[overkill4]

Hi All,

Attached is an image of the animation I'm working on. I've set up two paths for the piece of LVL to follow. The LVL is constrained by attaching the front and rear corners of the LVL to the corresponding front and rear paths.

However, when I animate this process Solidworks has a tendency to flip the piece of LVL around so that the rear point is all of a sudden at the front of the LVL.

So the question is, Is there some constraint I can add that will ensure that my front edge is always in front of the back edge of the LVL?

60% of the time, it works every time.

 

[Theophilus]

That part looks fairly planar--use a parallel mate from the planar part to another plane and it should follow better. Good luck--Animator is a pain!



Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

What did you dream? It's all right--we told you what to dream.
--Pink Floyd, Welcome to the Machine

 

[overkill4]

I guess I could try adding more that 1 parallel mate.

I'll give it a shot

Thanks.



60% of the time, it works every time.

 

[Theophilus]

I've had animations before in which parts will inexplicably flip 180 degrees at random parts along the path. No way to fix that problem--have to start a new animation and try to assemble things in a different order. In these cases, the mates are properly constrained, so this seems to be an Animator bug (among many). I know I don't sound too fond of Animator, but I do use it fairly frequently (useful, but limited and frustrating).



Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

What did you dream? It's all right--we told you what to dream.
--Pink Floyd, Welcome to the Machine

 

[overkill4]

Yah this is my first foray into serious Animation.



60% of the time, it works every time.

 

[Eltron]

Yeah, I don't know why they can't get this flipping thing figured out. It's a real pain in the o-ring. It's frustrating because they go though the trouble of giving us the option for path mates and belt creation, but if you want anything to follow the path you have to cross your fingers.

I would add the parallel mates. It may or may not help. Also, I've had pretty good luck when I use distance and angle mates to control the motion in animator. If you put a distance mate on the front face of your LVL and mate it to a plane somewhere, animator will allow you to change the values. This sometimes stabilizes the schitzo flips.

Dan

http://www.eltronresearch.com

 

[overkill4]

I think I have it licked now. I added a distance mate to one of the front edges of the LVL. I couldn't uses a planar mate due to the fact that the angle of that front face changes so much.

1 more question. Is there a way to fine tune the timing by manually inputing a time for a keyframe, instead of dragging the keys around to set time splits.


60% of the time, it works every time.

 

[Theophilus]

You can zoom in the timeline for fine-tuning--otherwise, I don't know of manual inputs.



Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

What did you dream? It's all right--we told you what to dream.
--Pink Floyd, Welcome to the Machine