Creating Swept Surfaces Using a Conical Profile

You can create swept surfaces that use an implicit conical profile, such as parabolas, hyperbolas or ellipses.

These swept surfaces are created based on guide curves and tangency directions. The latter can be defined either by the supporting surface or a curve giving the direction.

This task shows you how to:

Before you begin: Create a 3D shape containing sketches and curves.
Related Topics
About Swept Surfaces

Two guide curves

You can create swept surfaces that use an implicit conical profile by defining two guide curves.

  1. Click Sweep .

    The Swept Surface Definition dialog box appears.

  2. Click the Conic icon and select Two guide curves from the Subtype list.



  3. Select two guide curves and their tangency supports, indicating an angle value in relation to the support, if needed.

  4. Set the Parameter value. It is a ratio ranging from 0 to 1 (excluded), and is used to define a passing point as described in Creating Conic Curves and illustrated in the diagram.

  5. If needed, select a Spine to specify a spine different from the first guide curve or center curve. If the plane normal to the spine intersects one of the guiding curves at different points, it is advised to use the closest point to the spine point for coupling.

  6. Click OK to create the swept surface.

    The surface (identified as Sweep.xxx) is added to the specification tree.

Three guide curves

You can create swept surfaces that use an implicit conical profile by defining three guide curves.

  1. Click Sweep .

    The Swept Surface Definition dialog box appears.

  2. Click the Conic icon and select Three guide curves from the Subtype list.



  3. Select three guide curves, and the tangency supports for the first and last guides. If needed, indicate an angle in relation to the support.

  4. If needed, select a Spine to specify a spine different from the first guide curve or center curve. If the plane normal to the spine intersects one of the guiding curves at different points, it is advised to use the closest point to the spine point for coupling.

  5. Click OK to create the swept surface.

    The surface (identified as Sweep.xxx) is added to the specification tree.

Four guide curves

You can create swept surfaces that use an implicit conical profile by defining four guide curves.

  1. Click Sweep .

    The Swept Surface Definition dialog box appears.

  2. Click the Conic icon and select Four guide curves from the Subtype list.



  3. Select four guide curves and the tangency support for the first guide.

    If needed, indicate an angle in relation to the support.

  4. If needed, select a Spine to specify a spine different from the first guide curve or center curve. If the plane normal to the spine intersects one of the guiding curves at different points, it is advised to use the closest point to the spine point for coupling.

  5. Click OK to create the swept surface.

    The surface (identified as Sweep.xxx) is added to the specification tree.

Five guide curves

You can create swept surfaces that use an implicit conical profile by defining five guide curves.

  1. Click Sweep .

    The Swept Surface Definition dialog box appears.

  2. Click the Conic icon and select Five guide curves from the Subtype list.



  3. Select five guide curves.

  4. If needed, select a Spine to specify a spine different from the first guide curve or center curve. If the plane normal to the spine intersects one of the guiding curves at different points, it is advised to use the closest point to the spine point for coupling.

  5. Click OK to create the swept surface.

    The surface (identified as Sweep.xxx) is added to the specification tree.