Thanks very much to everyone for your help and suggestions.
Anis, I just spent some time looking at those links you supplied to Pepakura and Lamina Design. I could have LOTS of fun with either of those programs! Ultimately I may pick up an application that is designed for that specific purpose of flattening surfaces. Still, MoI is the best and I am always surprised by what CAN be done with it.
Burrman, thanks for the attempt. I’m smiling because you probably approached the problem as I did. It really looked like a simple exercise. In real life it is easy to flatten things. Then I found myself scratching my head and stumped. That script for Curve Length will be very useful to me for this project and others, thanks. As for now because I am impatient, once I am satisfied with a design, I will go back and convert the original curve to a Polyline as I described in the first post. That script will allow me to use fewer points (and fewer rotation operations = less time), because I can Scale 1D the result to the correct length.
Michael, MoI just keeps getting better, Thanks
- Dan