Getting Started with tinkerCAD (4): Use the Alignment Tool and Workplane Helper

introduce

In this lesson we will build a simple castle. You'll learn all about alignment tools, mirroring, and helper tools.

start

The first tool you will use is the alignment tool.

Instead of carefully positioning two parts with the mouse, the alignment tool can align them for you.

With two or more objects selected, click the Align tool in the Adjust menu. You will see three handles appear on the axis. Clicking the middle handle will center the object along that axis.

Note that when you hover over a handle, Tinkercad will display hints of potential outcomes, making it easy to choose the correct alignment handle!

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Drag the cylinder and cone to the workplane.
Make the cylinder 30mm high and lift the cone 30mm off the workplane.
Select both objects.
Use the alignment tool in the adjustment menu.
Click the center handle on the X and Y axes.

4. Align to Object (1 of 2)

In the last step, both objects are aligned to the space between them. What if you don't want one of the objects to move?

When you try to align the pattern, this time move the mouse over one of the objects. You will see some gray handles appear. These handles are what you see when you align one object with another.

This means that the objects you selected will stay in place and other objects will move.

Let's try it!

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Drag out a box so that it is 20 mm high, 60 mm long, and 4 mm thick.
Drag the end of the wall to align with the center of the tower.
Select the tower and the wall at the same time.
Head to the Adjustments menu and click on the Alignment Tool.
Click on the tower.

Align to Object (2 of 2)

In addition to the center handle we used, there are two limit handles for each axis. These limit handles allow you to align two objects so that they share the same edge.

Let's align the walls so that they extend in a straight line from the circumference of the cylinder. Click the limit handle at the end of the parallel line closest to the wall.

Now the circle of the tower and the surface of the wall merge into each other. This tidy feature is called "tangent relationship". I will explain this in the next step.

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Click the limit handle at the end of the parallel line closest to the wall.

tangent on tangent

There are many ways to describe how objects fit together, these ways are often called "relationships".

A very useful relationship is the Tangent relationship.

In geometry, a tangent is a line or plane that touches the circle at exactly one point such that, if you extend the line, it doesn't go through the circle. It's called a "tangent relationship".

Putting this relationship into words can help you think and talk about your designs!

copy and paste

What if you want to create multiple copies of the object? We'll use the copy and paste tool instead of the duplication tool.

Copy and Paste remembers items you copy, so you can paste objects any number of times and in any number of places.

Paste will make a copy identical to the original, and will only offset the copy slightly. This makes grabbing objects easier.

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Select Cone and Cylinder.
On the menu bar, click Edit and Copy.
In the menu bar, click Edit and Paste.

Align multiple objects

Select the copied tower and roof, and drag them so that the copy is centered at the end of the wall.

You'll notice that we didn't use the alignment tool to do this. The alignment tool is powerful, but it doesn't have a mode for aligning the center of one object to the end of another.

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Move the tower so that its center lines up with the end of the wall.
With the roof and towers selected, also select the walls.
Align the tower and roof with the wall so that the tower and wall form a nice tangent.

We want taller towers!

Making the front of the castle significantly different from the back of the castle might make it more exciting, so let's make the rear towers taller than the front towers.

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Raise the cone to 40mm and make the cylinder 40mm high.

Duplicate the wall and align it to the tower

Now that we have made one wall, we can copy and paste the next wall and rotate it 90° about the Z axis. If you need help remembering how to rotate around the Z axis, remember our 3D modeler salutes.

Now align the tower to the wall similar to how we aligned the wall to the first tower.

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Copy and paste the wall.
Rotate it 90° around the Z axis.
Align the end of the wall with the center of the tower.
Use the Align tool to make the wall tangent to the cylinder.

Duplicate and align to next wall

Duplicate this wall again and do the same for the other side. This will be our battle line.

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Copy and paste walls.
Line up the end of the wall to the center of the tower.
Use the alignment tool to make the wall tangent to the cylinder.

Group items for easier alignment

When you align multiple objects, Tinkercad will align them independently, so you may end up with all the parts stacked together. Probably not what you want!

We can avoid this by temporarily grouping objects before aligning them. This will make them behave like one object!

Once we are done aligning the objects, we can ungroup the objects.

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Group the towers and original walls.
Copy and paste the group.

mirror object

Our new team will be on the other side of the castle, but beware, the wall is on the wrong side!

Tinkercad has a mirror tool that can reverse any object along any axis! You can flip from front to back, right to left, or upside down.

When using the mirror tool, you will see a double arrow handle for each axis. Hovering the mouse cursor over a handle will give you a hint of the result so you can see which handle works best for you.

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Move grouped objects to the other side.
Go to the menu bar, the Adjustments menu, and choose Mirror.
Use the handle parallel to the wall to mirror on that axis.

Align grouped objects

Now that the walls are mirrored, all we have to do is align it to one of the walls!
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Align this grouped object to one of the walls.

delete power

Hum, you don't know if you like castles with steeples. Wouldn't it make more sense to have towers that we could place archers for defense? We should replace the steeples with some battlements from which archers can shoot arrows!

It's not too late to change your mind.

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Choose the tower.
Ungroup the towers.

delete point

Now select the cones, and delete them. Go to the menu bar, pull down the Edit menu, and click Delete!

Pfft, they're gone...

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Select the cone.
Select Delete from the Edit menu, or press the Delete key.

Use the workplane helper

Now you can imagine all the steps needed to make and move the battlements for the tower. Workplane Assistant should speed things up!

With it, you can build on top of something, skipping any tedious measuring and moving around!

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Click the Helper menu.
Drag the workplane helper onto the top of one of the short cylinders.

Build our battlements on the new workplane

Now, when you drag items onto the workplane, they will appear at the height of the top of the tower.

Let's build the perimeter of the battlements.

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Drag out the polygon and extrude it to 26mm between points, then shrink until it is 5mm high.
Drag out the cylinder and change it to a hole in the inspector.
Adjust the diameter of the cylinder to 16 mm while holding down Shift and Alt.
Align the cylinder with the hex.
Group cylinders and polygons.
Align the battlements with the first tower.

Paste to new workplane

Now copy and paste the battlements and align them to the next tower. When you take out the workplane helper, you'll paste to the new workplane, automatically placing the battlements at the correct height.

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Copy and paste the battlements and align them to the next tower.
Move the workplane to the top of the taller tower.
Glue the new battlements and align them to the remaining two towers.

Not just a new plane, a new coordinate system!

For our next trick, drag the workplane helper to the front of the castle... yes, the wall... yes, up and down!

As you drag the shapes onto the workplane, they will appear and move on the surface of the castle walls. Go ahead and personalize your castle. Give your castle a name, or put some windows and arrow slots along the walls for more archers! Do this for the other walls! go Ape!

You can return to the original workplane by dragging the workplane helper to an empty space.

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Drag the workplane helper to the front of the castle.
Try working in this new workplane.
Move the workplane to a new drawing and experiment there.
Drag the workplane helper to an empty area to restore it to its original position.

print your project

This is a fun project, now let's print it. What we will do now is explore the process of exporting the model for 3D printing.

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On the right side of the top menu bar, click Export.
Select the "Everything in Design" option.
choose. STL (Standard Tessellation Language).
After clicking the button, your model will be downloaded by your web browser just like any other file download.
Save this file with a name you can remember, and load it into the 3D printer's software.