How Do I Twist a Bus Bar in Sheetmetal?

SOLIDWORKS How To Questions
1

I’m not that good in Sheetmetal, can only do the basics. I am trying to make a copper bus bar that is twisted 3° on one end.

I tried many things in sheetmetal but couldn’t figure it out. I know there are at least a couple of way to make it using normal features like loft and sweep.

If you open the SW part attached to this e-mail you will see what I’m trying to do.

I want the part to be made as a sheet metal part AND be able to flatten it.

Its probably a 5 minute job for you expert sheetmetal guys.

Please upload a sample of it… :slight_smile:

Thank you,
twisted busbar.SLDPRT (81.9 KB)

2

Sheet metal won’t form in this way…it’s mostly for straight bends and some limited cases of bends around a curve.

You could extrude your bar full length then use the “Flex” feature to twist it starting in the middle. Or you could just configure the 3° angle dimension in Sketch3 to 0° in your flat configuration.

3

I used a Loft-Bend for this Dan.. Note my two 3d sketches I was able to open your file (future version for me) in 2020 export it and import it in order to work on it but I’m pretty sure the solid is correct.. One of these days I might be able to figure this out.. How do I delete the extra files I had no idea had been added?
twisted busbar_db.SLDPRT (96.2 KB)

4

I’m going to try this again.. Think I’m getting the hang of adding files.. I did this with Lofted-Bend.. Note the two 3D sketches. Your file is a future version for me but I was able to get the info I needed from a dumb solid.

5

Nice trick with the lofted bend.

6

That worked great. I added (2) new 3D sketches with a spline and made the spline tangent to the straight part of bar. Did the lofted bend. Worked like a charm! :smiley: :slight_smile:

Thank you so much…

Dan B.