I'm just throwing this out for opinions.

When I shell an object, I typically model the outside surface and want to shell it to the inside, to create the thickness. However, anyone who works with small or detailed forms knows that often doesn't work very well. Often, I am then forced to try and model the inside surface, and shell outwards for a good result. This means taking into account any radii, fillets, etc.

Any opinions, suggestions, comments? Or is my workflow just wrong?
Ron

Hi Ron, well a lot of the problem is that the geometry library that MoI uses just doesn't have a particularly robust shelling mechanism in it, it can get confused pretty easily if different areas would end up needing to collide into one another.

If you know in advance that you're going to want to shell something that will cause something like a fillet surface on the outside to totally be consumed away you would probably want to do the filleting after the shelling rather than before.

If MoI's sheller fails for your part, really the best thing to try to start with is to import your model into a different CAD system like ViaCAD which is also pretty inexpensive and see if it will shell it as-is without needing to do any reconstruction.

- Michael

Thanks, Michael. I just bought ViaCAD last night. I'll have to learn / try that. As usual, it is probably a matter of trial and error to come up with the best workflow. I find that injection molded parts give me the most issues. It's hard to think of all the potential trouble spots when you are concentrating mostly on the finished parts.