Computer graphics processing and selective visual display system – Computer graphics processing – Three-dimension
Reexamination Certificate
1997-03-27
2001-09-25
Jankus, Almis R. (Department: 2671)
Computer graphics processing and selective visual display system
Computer graphics processing
Three-dimension
C345S473000, C345S960000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06295063
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for producing an exploded view, the exploded view being produced for the purpose of showing the structure of an assembly composed of plural parts, an assembling procedure in a manufacturing process, or a procedure for maintenance and inspection or repairing of the structure, for example.
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for producing an animation showing assembling of parts by which a structure of an assembly composed of plural parts, or an assembling procedure in a manufacturing process, is confirmed on a screen of a central processing unit.
An exploded view is a drawing in which parts composing an assembly are disassembled from an assembled state into pieces and arranged in an assembling order in the reverse direction of attachment. Such an exploded view is used for the purpose of showing the structure of an assembly composed of plural parts, an assembling procedure in a manufacturing process, or a procedure for maintenance and inspection or repairing of the structure, for example.
In the past, an exploded view has been produced by hand procedure manual showing assembling procedure and the like.
And in recent years, a CAD system is used in design of products. An operator has made an exploded view by producing an assembly drawing of a product produced using a three-dimensional CAD system and by moving parts with moving command in taking the assembling procedure into consideration based on the data produced with the three-dimensional CAD system.
In the conventional technology, it has taken a very long time to make an exploded view since it is produced by hand. Although by utilizing geometrical data of assembly produced with a three-dimensional CAD system eliminates needs to draw at least geometrical pictures of parts, it takes a long time for an operator to move parts one by one by instructing moving directions and moving amounts.
Further, in a stage of studying an assembling procedure in the preparation state of manufacturing, it is necessary to confirm whether the assembling procedure is correct or not. However, since a try and error method is required in determining an assembling procedure, there is a problem in that it takes a large manpower to do making the exploded view over by hand in every procedure change.
In a conventional method of process procedure for producing an animation of assembling, an assembled model as a geometry of a product in an assembled state is produced using a three-dimensional CAD system, and geometrical data is input in an animation display system. Then, operating data inputting operation process is executed to set operating data as input parameters for animation display function.
After setting the operating data to each of parts composing the product, animation producing process is executed to display the sembling process of the product by animation.
In the above operating data inputting process, a subject part for operating data is firstly specified. Next, the kind, the direction and the amount of operation are set. Assuming that a part is moved, for example, straight in the positive direction of z-axis by the distance of “500”, it is necessary to set as “straight moving”, (0.0, 0.0, 1.0), “500.0”.
Lastly, the time step of operation is set. The time step is to indicate the time range of moving of the part, and in order to make confirmation of attaching order of parts, an operator needs to set the time step so that the time range is not overlapped with a time range of another part with taking the attaching order of each part into consideration.
In a conventional apparatus for producing animation of assembling, a program for inputting geometrical data takes out geometrical information of an assembly from an input unit and stores it to a geometrical data area. A program for inputting operating data inputs operating data as input parameters for animation display function for each part composing the assembly from the input unit.
A program for producing animation produces animation data from the geometrical data and the operating data and outputs it to the output unit. As described above, in the conventional method, it is necessary to set the operation data to all the parts composing the assembly with taking the attaching order into consideration.
The conventional technique is described in, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No.61-147375 (1986), Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No.5-324779 (1993), Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No.4-37960 (1992).
In the conventional technology for producing animation, there is a disadvantage in that operation of an operator becomes complicated since the operating data has to be set each unit of parts. Further, there is a disadvantage in that when number of parts in a product is large, it takes very long time to set operating data to the parts with taking the assembling order of the product into consideration.
Furthermore, there is a disadvantage in that it is difficult for the operator to understand the detailed contents and the degree of difficulty of the assembling work using a simple animation in which all the parts to be attached are moved in a constant speed or are expressed with the same attribute.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and a method for easily producing an exploded view capable of confirming an assembling procedure in ease.
The object of the present invention can be attained by providing an apparatus for producing an exploded view having an input unit, a geometrical data memory for storing geometrical data of parts composing an assembly and a calculating unit for displaying the assembly to a display unit based on said geometrical data, which comprises means for determining arranged positions of the parts composing said assembly in a disassembled state based on assembling process data and said geometrical data, an exploded view being displayed in said display unit corresponding to said arranged positions determined.
More particularly, said assembling process data is composed of assembling orders and assembling directions, and said arranging position determining means calculates the scalar products of the vertex coordinates of the part and the assembling vector and obtaining the minimum value of the scalar products, calculating the scalar products of said read-out vertex coordinates of the part and said read-out assembling direction vector and obtaining the maximum value of the scalar products, obtaining the difference between the minimum value of scalar product and the maximum value of scalar product and determining distances between the parts composing said assembly in a disassembled state on an exploded view based on the obtained difference, and displaying an exploded view in said display unit corresponding to said distances determined.
According to the present invention, the arranging position determining means calculates the scalar products of the vertex coordinates of the part and the assembling vector and obtaining the minimum value of the scalar products, calculating the scalar products of said read-out vertex coordinates of the part and said read-out assembling direction vector and obtaining the maximum value of the scalar products, obtaining the difference between the minimum value of scalar product and the maximum value of scalar product and determining distances between the parts composing said assembly in a disassembled state on an exploded view based on the obtained difference, and displaying an exploded view in said display unit corresponding to said distances determined.
Therefore, an exploded view can be automatically produced, the manpower to producing an exploded view can be decreased by eliminating the operator's conventional work to move parts by instructing a moving direction and a moving amount one by one.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and a method to easily produce an animation of assembling by which the detailed contents and the degree of difficult
Ishida Tomotoshi
Kumamoto Kunio
Minami Shunsuke
Shinotsuka Yoshiaki
Antonelli Terry Stout & Kraus LLP
Hitachi , Ltd.
Jankus Almis R.
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