Cracks in the System
Cybersecurity threats don’t always kick the door down—sometimes, they slip in through the cracks. This month, we’re spotlighting three subtle but serious security risks that could be undermining your defences right now.
Excitech has become Symetri
In January 2020, Excitech was acquired by Addnode Group, the owner of Symetri, Europe’s leading provider of software and services for design and engineering activities.
Excitech has now become Symetri, operating as one company since the beginning of January 2021. Please rest assured it is business as usual for us and your service experience will not be impacted.
An introduction to AutoCAD 3D Tools
AutoCAD is widely known and utilised as a 2D drafting tool. However, its use for 3D modelling is not as prevalent. This post introduces AutoCAD users to some of the most common 3D tools in AutoCAD by creating the simple shape shown below.
Before we start modelling, we need to change the workspace to “3D modeling” from the status bar at the bottom of the application. The ribbon will update to show 3D tools.
You can start by navigating to an isometric view by clicking on a corner of the view cube on the top right of model space. If you do not see the view cube, you can make it visible from the ‘View’ tab of the ribbon. Launch the 3DPOLY command to draw a closed 3D polyline in the front view (XZ plane). Starting on the origin and with ortho mode on (F8), start drawing as you would in a 2D view, keeping in mind that if you specify coordinates, you will need to provide them in all three axes.
Select the EXTRUDE command from the ‘Home’ tab of the AutoCAD ribbon, pick the 3D polyline from the previous step and then type 90 as the height of extrusion to create a 3D solid. You can control the visual style from the top left corner of model space.
Draw a triangle using a closed 3D polyline as shown below and extrude it to the back of the shape. You may find the ‘Extension’ object snap useful to find the vertices of the triangle.
At this point, we have two independent solids that intersect. Pick the UNION command and then select them both to combine them into a single object.
To finish the shape, draw a rectangle on the top face and extrude it to the base. Using the SUBTRACT tool, select the solid to subtract from first, press <Enter>, and then select the solid to subtract.
I hope you found this quick introduction to the 3D tools in AutoCAD useful. If you would like to learn more about this topic, you may want to consider our AutoCAD 3D Drawing and Modelling training course.
Contact us
Please submit your enquiry here and a member of our team will get in touch.
Alternatively call 0345 370 1444
What is Product Lifecycle Management (PLM)?
Learn what Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) is and how it helps teams manage product data, processes, and collaboration across the lifecycle. Discover the key benefits and PLM tools driving innovation.
Sovelia Vault: The Smarter Way to Manage Design Data
If you are an Autodesk Vault user in the mechanical engineering and manufacturing industry, you are likely familiar with the challenges of managing design data. While Vault provides a solid foundation for storing and organising design data, it falls short in some critical areas. You might have noticed this if you ever wanted to automate workflows or configure company-specific rules and processes in Vault. Let’s dive into these challenges and possible solutions.
+44345 370 1500 · info@symetri.co.uk