Custom badge making company?

[AliveBoy]

As an engineer who uses proper CAD programs, sketchup makes me cry.

 

As people have said, 3D print it, it'd cost you pennies to get done. There are plenty of geeky people around who have built their own or bought cheap 3D printer systems. The machine to 3D print something that size only costs you a couple hundred not thousands. The CAD wouldn't take long to do if you can find the right font for it.

 

As a non engineer, with no experience of CAD systems what's wrong with Sketchup? (Genuine question, not taking the P!)

 

How about this one: http://www.123dapp.com/

 

Edit: found 123dapp one on the 3d printing site above, not my finding

Edited June 11, 2014 by AliveBoy

[Husky]

I tried using sketchup for some small parts, I was on my laptop and didn't have access to my desktop with Autodesk at the time. As I drew the part I realised that sketchup can't actually cope with curves, not small ones anyway. It simply drew it as a many sided polygon.

 

Now I understand the limitations of a computer meaning it can't cope with the infinite precision of a circles edge but it's handling of this was very poor. What it should do is understand the curve drawn is a... curve. The curve should be represented within the program by it's appropriate equation and the resulting image of said curve should be created based on that equation, this also means that when you reference a point on that curve you get a very accurate report of distance or whatever it was you wanted to find out. All the program is doingis plug in the numbers to the curves equation and out pops the answer. Also, when you zoom in closer and closer to the curve, it redraws it with the appropriate number of plotted points so it appears appear smooth to you at that zoom level, the closer you get the more plotted points that curve would have (I'm talking visually here). So inside the program the curve is just an equation and any manipulation of it is done within the maths before being displayed to the user.

 

What sketchup does it simplify curves by plotting points along it's path to a set precision, and that's it done permanently. So, when you are zoomed out it'll be fine, and if you are taking a measurement in say, cm's you're going to get a perfectly accurate result. However, once you zoom in you notice the plotting, and you also notice that the points are plotted far enough apart you can't get the precision you need in a measurement. Sketchup doesn't deal with the model you are building in equations, it deals with it as plotted points in three dimensional space and vectors that are associated with those points. The solid faces you see are also just groupings of vectors that should be associated to make a plane. The restriction of this is that it gets highly confused when it comes to understanding what is and is not solid, what is the outside surface and what is not. Again it also it comes down to curved surfaces, a cylinder, instead of being a smooth cylinder becomes a polygon tube. You are able to simply delete a face in sketchup and it'll be gone, your part will have an open side and be completely hollow, the part should be solid so in essence you shouldn't be able to do this. you should be able to manipulate the points in space and thus the vectors associated with them, but not the faces that are placed between them.

 

The bottom line is that sketchup is designed to be a lightweight and free to use tool. Obviously a decision was made to make the tool work in the way it does to avoid the computational stress that comes along with normal CAD packages. That decision isn't noticable when you draw an image of a plank of wood, but for the fine details it can make a huge difference.

 

Some examples:

 

this is an assembly I drew in sketchup after many many hours of fighting with it.

 

from a distance it looks fine, the edges of the circles are plotted to enough precision to appear as circles with no issue. however as you loko closer you can see the jagged edges creeping in:

 

 

When you look at the same part done in CAD at a similar zoom you can see there are no jagged edges as the part is redrawn with suitable precision for the zoom level:

 

 

Another part as an example:

 

 

 

The whole assembly as rendered in Autodesk Inventor:

 

 

 

 

 

Hopefully I haven't made any glaring mistakes, if I have, some CAD guru can correct me as I'm just a novice.

 

Sorry for going off topic. (if you want to go into it further feel free to quote me into a new thread)

Edited June 11, 2014 by Husky

[Grundy]

CnC Machine it? It will be metal, but if you can find the measurements or even better the G-Codes, I can get these made up no problem.

[LRF4N]

Or since it's a made up motorsport brand why not just draw it on with crayons

[Husky]

Quick google, probs worth going and asking these guys if they have any

 

http://www.ukcorsa-d.com/forum/showthread.php?67638-VXD-badge

 

http://www.vxronline.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?94890-Does-anyone-know-where-I-can-get-some-VXD-badges

[AliveBoy]

Quick google, probs worth going and asking these guys if they have any

 

http://www.ukcorsa-d...67638-VXD-badge

 

http://www.vxronline...some-VXD-badges

 

1) That guy in the first link is a "photoshop moderator"

2) They look gash

3) VXD isn't such an original idea, but a pretty common one

4) Even the owners club members think it's rubbish

5) The one in the first link has a limp "D", the worst problem possible to happen to man

[ddcboyle]

Only issue with the topic is lack of interest for them to get made and it was 1013. Thinking od maybe changing my idea on how to mod the car, maybe just go for the full black stealth car. No need for badges and colour and makes it cheaper didnt realise it was this complicated for badges to be made. I understand why now thoughh