Tutorials PartCraft help Walkthroughs
Measure distances, angles and mass
Click two things in the view for the exact minimum distance, angle and ΔX ΔY ΔZ; read an edge's length, a hole's diameter, a face's area or a point's coordinates; get volume, mass, centre of mass and inertia of a part or an assembly.
Written for PartCraft 0.3. The same help is inside the app: press F1.
Measure works on the model in every workspace (Design, Form, Simulation, Generative, Manufacture) and in an assembly. It is in the View group's Views menu, or press MM. A card opens over the top left of the view.
Measure one thing
Click a vertex, an edge or a face. The card shows:
- A point (a vertex, an edge midpoint or a circle centre): its X, Y, Z.
- An edge: straight, arc or circle, and its length; for an arc or a circle also the radius, the diameter and the centre.
- A face: flat, cylinder, cone and so on, and its area; a flat face's normal; a cylinder's radius and diameter (a hole's size).
- The whole body: hold ⇧Shift and click the part. You get its volume, area, mass and inertia (see below).
The pointer snaps to vertices, edge midpoints and circle centres within 10 pixels; a small blue dot shows the snap before you click. To pick a hole's centre, point at the middle of the hole; to pick its rim (the circle), point at the rim.
Measure between two things
Click a second item. The card adds:
- Minimum distance and the two closest points, drawn in the view with a line between them.
- ΔX, ΔY, ΔZ from the first closest point to the second.
- Angle between two flat faces (between their normals, 0–180°), between two straight edges or axes (0–90°), or between an edge and a face.
- Gap between the planes for two parallel flat faces, Centre to centre for two circles or holes, Axis to axis for two parallel holes or cylinders.
A third click starts a new pair. EscEsc clears the picks; EscEsc again (or Close) closes Measure. Copy puts the results on the clipboard as tab-separated text, ready to paste into a spreadsheet.
How exact it is
With the exact kernel (OpenCascade), the minimum distance between faces, edges and bodies comes from OpenCascade's own distance algorithm on the true surfaces, so a Ø16 hole measures 16 and the gap between two holes is the exact geometric value. Distances between two points, lengths, radii, areas and angles are exact too. Without the exact kernel the distance is worked out on the facets of the mesh and the card says approximate: of the facets: right for flat faces, slightly off for curved ones.
Mass properties
Choose Mass properties in the card or in the Views menu. On a part, pick a Material in the card (steel, aluminum, plastics and others with their usual densities). In an assembly each part uses the material set in its properties (select the part, then Material), and the result is for all the parts together.
The card shows mass, volume, area, centre of mass, the inertia tensor (Ixx, Iyy, Izz and the products Ixy, Iyz, Ixz, in kg·mm², about the centre of mass along the world axes) and the principal moments. Without a material it shows the same per unit density (mm⁵) and no mass.
With the exact kernel the numbers are OpenCascade's exact volume integrals of the solid. With the mesh kernel they are exact for the tessellated solid (curved faces as facets), and the card says so. Material densities are typical handbook values; a real alloy or grade can differ by a few per cent.
Limits
- Snaps can find a point hidden behind other geometry; check the card says what you meant.
- Edges are picked only with the exact kernel. With the mesh kernel, measure between vertices and faces.
- Measure is closed when you open a sketch or the drawing sheet, or switch workspace.