Trouble with 3D Mitre

I'm constructing an aluminum handrail system and need some help in getting the 3D detail of the miter conditions drawn correctly.

In the attached file you will see that I'm trying to show how the two shapes running diagonally to the vertical post will appear will appear once they have been properly cut. I tried SUBTRACT and UNION but it appears I'm not on the right track.

Can anyone offer some advice as to how to get this miter lay out correct?

Mitre Question.dwg

Try the SLICE command.

FYI, I think part of the handrail is crossing over the origin so if you created a cube to subtract from it, you'd need to change views and move it a bit so it encompasses everything.

As indicated, Slice is probably the way to go (I didn't look at your file).

http://home.pct.edu/~jmather/content/CAD238/AutoCAD%202007%20Tutorial%208.pdf

Yes, SLICE took care of that problem for me. Now if I can just get this guy at the cut-off saw to follow the drawing.

I recommend the motivational techniques put forward in the Saw movie franchise.

Thanks everyone for your replies. Now I have the exact opposite problem. I need to extend or stretch the extrusions. I have tried stretch but it only moves the shapes it doesn't lengthen them.

Can anyone tell me how I extend the 3D solids? I have attached a new file which shows what I'm after.

Stretch Question.dwg

Here try this?

Stretched.dwg

That's great, but how did you do it?

The easiest way to do it would probably be to use your Offset Faces from your solid editing tools.

First off you have to get the ucs in the correct position whenever you want to move a face. To do this you need to use the 'Face UCS' icon (In the ucs toolbar) on the face you want to move. Then select the 'Move Faces' icon and an area inside the face you want to move.

You can also use 'press pull'

Switching the UCS may be needed for 2009, but it works for me just fine with out re-setting the UCS in 2008. (This works the same for Move Faces and Offset Faces)

Press-Pull seems to automatically turn on/off your dynamic UCS, so there would be no need of it either.

That is cool. I did not know that 'Move Faces' could do the same thing as the 'Offset Faces' for this application. So many ways to do things.

Thanks again team. But remember, not everyone has the same desktop setting as yours so let me say that this should have been answered like this:

Set the UCS icon to the face you want to move

Type SOLIDEDIT at the command line

Choose Face

Select the face you want to move

Then follow the prompts to move the face along the axis of your choice.

My system did not have the icons you mentioned so I had to search the Help Menus under "Move + Faces of 3d Solids". But I got the results I needed and thank you very much for your help.

Thanks again team. But remember, not everyone has the same desktop setting as yours so let me say that this should have been answered like this:

 

Set the UCS icon to the face you want to move

Type SOLIDEDIT at the command line

Choose Face

Select the face you want to move

 

Then follow the prompts to move the face along the axis of your choice.

 

My system did not have the icons you mentioned so I had to search the Help Menus under "Move + Faces of 3d Solids". But I got the results I needed and thank you very much for your help.

If you didn't have these icons you are still working in a 2d environment so may I suggest you switch to a 3D Workspace? If you are using the 3D Workspace then you would have found these icons in the Solid Edit panel for the 'Move Faces' & also in the UCS panel like I mentioned for the 'UCS Face'.

If you want to customize you workspace you can do so via right clicking near a toolbar and selecting 'Customize'.

The way some things are explained to people are not always exactly unless it is done by console commands, which is a very long way around doing stuff sometimes, but not all times. ACAD 2009 has an excellent help system that has tutorials and very good explanations so that will always be a good fail safe should you not understand what someone has told you. We are all here to help