AutoDesk Inventor Exercise 2

See the plan view with all dimensions on the

last page.

In this tutorial you will be working with a little bit more advanced sketch

layout, and revolving that sketch to create a pulley. The pulley will have

parametric equations built in to allow for the diameter of the pulley to be

changed easily.

1. Start a new Metric drawing file.

2. Click on new 2D sketch and choose the XY plane.

3. Draw a line horizontally through the center axis

50mm long. This will become the axis of your revolve

and the base for other lines.

4. Using the Vertical constraint align the center

of the new line with the origin point.

5. Offset the 50mm line in the Y+ direction

16.1mm.

6. Offset 4 more lines at 25mm, 50mm, 60mm and

75mm.

7. Go into the Parameters dialogue box and change

the name of the 75mm dimension to “Radius.”

8. At the bottom of the Parameters dialogue box, click

Add Numeric. This adds a user defined parameter

that can be used for other calculations. Change the

name to “Diameter” and change the value to 150mm.

9. Change equation of the “Radius” to “Diameter/2”.

10. Back to the sketch, double click the 60mm dimension and change the

number to “Radius – 15”.

11. Change the 50mm dimension to “Radius – 25”.

This will ensure that if we wanted to create a larger or smaller pulley, all we need to

do is change the Radius of the outside, and the shape of the grooves will stay the

same while the pulley gets larger.

12. Select the first line that you created which goes

through the origin. Click on the construction line icon

to turn the line into a construction line. This allows the line to

be used for layout, but not impede any of the sketch shapes

you need.

13. With construction line still highlighted, draw a

construction line vertical from the origin to the farthest line.

14. Layout one half of the shape of the pulley to one side

of the vertical construction line. Delete the horizontal

line extensions except where they are needed in the

shape. Refer to drawing of the part.

15. Ensure that the model is fully constrained. The lines

will be purple when they are constrained.

Notice that the total height, the bottom of the

pulley channel, and the underside of the pulley are

still locked in with the original dimensions that

they were given.

16. Mirror all of the lines you drew for one half of the

shape across the vertical center line.

17. Click Finish Sketch.

18. Select the Revolve feature from the

3D tab.

19. Select the inside of the sketched shape as the

profile and select the original 50mm line that

crosses the origin as your axis of rotation.

20. Create a new sketch on the outer face of the inner

pulley hub.

21. Use the Project Geometry tool to

project the line of the hole onto the

sketch plane.

22. Draw a 10mm wide x 4mm rectangle, center it on

the Y-axis, and align the bottom corner onto the

projected circle. This will be the keyway.

This ensures that the keyway will be the correct depth,

and if the width is changed, it will stay aligned with the

circle.

23. Extrude with cut, the keyway from the hub.

24. In Parameters, change the name of the 10mm

keyway width to “keywidth.”

25. Try changing the “keywidth” to 20mm and notice

that it stays in the same spot, and changes width.

26. While in Parameters, change the

“diameter” to 300mm. Notice how the

diameter of the object gets larger,

while the shapes of the hub and pulley

grooves stay the same.

This feature allows to you

create an object that can

easily be applied to a number

of different situations, as

pulleys need to come in a

variety of sizes. The

alternative would be to draw

many different sized pulleys

individually.

27. At the very top of the program

you will find a few menus that allow

you to choose the different kinds of

material and coloring that your

model has. Play around with the

different materials and colours to

give the model a different, more

realistic look. You can change

individual features separately.

*Please do not make the pulley from

water. The owner of the new pulley

will not appreciate its lack of

functionality*

Well Done, You’ve become a model student! :P