One question I sometimes receive from clients is controlling the orientation of our views after our part has already been modeled. One of the ways we can harness this capability in Inventor 2008 is the process of redefining our initial sketch plane.
By default all of your initial sketches are created on the XY plane (unless we choose otherwise). When we reach the point of placing our initial views in our drawing, one of our options for placement is the Front View, labeled XY, meaning if we use our ‘Look At’ tool in our model and choose the XY plane from our origin folder, we will see our corresponding view from our drawing.
By viewing my model below, you will get a clearer picture about what I mean:
NOTE: As we change the orientation of our initial sketch plane, any & all views in our drawing will update. For this example, I use a drawing with a Front view already placed.
Here is an isometric view of a part below. Keep note of my 3-D indicator in the bottom left corner referencing the XYZ planes (Red=X, Green=Y, Blue=Z)
Next I’ll use my ‘Look At’ Tool and choose the XY plane.
Again, notice the orientation of my 3D Indicator. You can see as I hover my cursor over the initial sketch, all of the sketch geometry becomes highlighted and is Normal to my default sketch plane, being the XY plane.
The corresponding ‘Front’ view in my drawing is shown below.
However, sometimes after our model has been created, we may need to manipulate the orientation of the views in our model and our drawing. We can do this by redefining our initial sketch plane. This is done by simply performing a Right Mouse Click on our initial sketch (In my example, the initial sketch creating my Revolution), and selecting ‘Redefine’.
Then simply choose the new plane we would like our sketch geometry to be placed upon. In this example, I chose the YZ plane. Notice the corresponding directions of my 3D indicator.
If we use our ‘Look At’ tool once more, and again choose our ‘XY’ plane now we get the corresponding view.
Finally, notice how the view in our drawing automatically recognizes our change and makes the corresponding update.
Thank you for visiting our website and accessing our tips and tricks. I hope this will benefit you in the future and allow you to make any necessary orientation changes seamlessly & effectively.
Paul Cetnar
Application Engineer, Manufacturing Solutions Division
