Creating Point Curve Joints

You can create a point curve joint to constraint the motion of a point from a body along the curve of another body. The point is associated with a marker and can rotate freely in all directions, and translate about the curve axis.

This task shows you how to:

See Also
About Joints

Specify the Definition Properties

  1. From the Mechanism section of the action bar, click Joint .
  2. In the dialog box, select Point Curve from the list of joint types.
  3. In the Definition section of the dialog box, select the two geometry elements between which to create the joint.
    1. Click the Curve box and select a curve in the work area.

      Note: The curve must belong to the geometry of a body that does not include the marker to use.

    2. Click the Point box and select a marker in the work area.

      Note: An automatic marker referencing the point is created. Its orientation corresponds to the orientation of its body reference marker.

    The name of the two elements appears in the corresponding boxes.
  4. To create the joint using a new point:
    1. Click Create new Marker .

      Tip: You can also click and select Create new Marker.

    2. In the dialog box, define a new marker. For more information, see Creating Markers.
    3. Click OK.
    The new element appears in the tree and is listed in the box. The origin of the marker coincides with the curve at the specified curvilinear distance.
    Note: If no curvilinear distance was specified at the creation of the point curve engineering connection, a curvilinear distance is defined by default.
  5. Optional: In the States table, specify values to control the joint motion. To do so, in each row:
    1. Select the Lower limit check box to enable a lower bound in a specific direction.
    2. Select the Value check box to enable an initial value.
    3. Select the Upper limit check box to enable an upper bound in a specific direction.

    Notes:
    • Each row corresponds to a translation or rotation degree of freedom. The number of rows depend on the joint type.
    • If the lower and upper limits are not applicable, no check box appears in the corresponding row or column.

  6. Optional: Specify a value, as well as upper and lower limits for the curvilinear distance of the curve.

Specify the Conic Properties

  1. In the Conic limit section of the dialog box, select the Enabled check box to constraint the angle between the cone axis and the tangent at the contact point (if the tangent exists).
  2. Specify a maximum angle value in degrees, between 0 deg and 180 deg.
  3. Select the cone axis on which to apply the upper bound.

Edit the Joint

  1. To edit a joint, in the tree, do one of the following:
    • Double-click a joint.
    • Right-click a joint and select Definition from the object menu.
  2. In the dialog box, edit the joint parameters.
  3. Click OK.

    Note: To modify the general properties or graphical properties of the element, right-click the element in the tree and select Properties. For more information, see Displaying Properties.