Extrude a spiral

[Dellboy]

I am unable to find a way to extrude a spiral in order to create a wound clock spring in 3D.I have tried drawing two concentric spirals, joining their ends with lines and trying to create a surface that i can extrude, but with no success. I cannot concieve of an appropriate means to achieve this.

[Fuge]

If I understand you correct.

Draw a circle and a 2d locus side by side.The distance of your 2d locus from your circle will be the radius of your spring. Selectboth and do a menu "Sweep.." command. enter the degrees and a pitch to create your spiral spring.

Fuge

[Matthew Giampapa]

The best way I can think to do this is with the spiral tool included with the program.

First, add the spiral tool to your workspace. It is under the Drafting tools category on the tools pallet. (Please note, depending on the version of VectorWorks you have, this tool may not be present in the Drafting Tools.mcd library. So it's best to add it directly to your workspace.)

Place and configure a spiral, then ungroup and extrude it.

Matthew GiampapaNNA Technical Support

[Dellboy]

Thanks spring drawn and looking excellent.

However i do need to draw another standard spring.

I would believe this would involve creating a fixed diameter spiral which extends in the Z plane.

drawing a circle the thickness of the springs wire in the XZ plane and extruding it along this spiral.

I am, however, unable to achieve this.

[Andrew Bell@NV]

quote:

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Originally posted by Dellboy:

Thanks spring drawn and looking excellent.However i do need to draw another standard spring. I would believe this would involve creating a fixed diameter spiral which extends in the Z plane.

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Adjust the pitch value when you create the spring to create a helix.

[Dellboy]

I can find no reference to a pitch value when creating a spiral or extruding a shape.

Totally flumoxed by this spring issue.