Sketcher ConstrainAngle

Constraint InternalAngle
Menu location
Sketch → Sketcher constraints → Constrain angle
Workbenches
Sketcher, PartDesign
Default shortcut
A
Introduced in version
-
See also
Constraint Length, Constraint Perpendicular

Description

Angle constraint is a datum constraint intended to fix angles in sketch. It is capable of setting slopes of individual lines, angles between lines, angles of intersections of curves, and angle spans of circular arcs.

How to use

There are four different ways the constraint can be applied:

1. to individual lines
2. between lines
3. to intersections of curves
4. to arcs of circles

To apply angle constraint, one should the follow the steps:

• Select one, two or three entities in the sketch. The mode will be chosen depending on the selection.
• Invoke the constraint by clicking its icon on the toolbar, or selecting the menu item, or using keyboard shortcut. A datum edit dialog box pops up.
• Modify the angle if necessary. The angle can be entered as an expression that will be evaluated and the result will be stored. Click OK.

As with any datum constraint, it is possible to change the angle value later by double-clicking the constraint in constraint list or 3d view. Entering a negative value will cause the angle direction to flip.

Constraint modes

line slope angle

Accepted selection: line

The constraint sets the polar angle of line's direction. It is the angle between the line and X axis of the sketch.

arc span (v0.15)

Accepted selection: arc of circle

In this mode, the constraint fixes angular span of a circular arc.

between lines

Accepted selection: line + line

In this mode, the constraint sets the angle between two lines. It is not required that the lines intersect.

between curves at intersection (angle-via-point) (v0.15)

Accepted selection: any line/curve + any line/curve + any point

In this mode, angle between two curves is constrained at the point of their intersection. The intersection point can be on curves' extensions. The point should be specified explicitly, since curves typically intersect in more than one point.

For the constraint to work correctly, the point must be on both curves. So, as the constraint is invoked, the point will be automatically constrained onto both curves (helper constraints will be added, if necessary), and the angle between curves will be constrained at the point. These helper constraints are plain regular constraints. They can be added manually, or deleted. There are no helper constraints on the example picture above, because the point selected is already the intersection of curves.

Scripting

Angle Constraint can be created from macros and from the python console by using the following:

# line slope angle
Sketch.addConstraint(Sketcher.Constraint('Angle',iline,angle))

# angular span of arc
Sketch.addConstraint(Sketcher.Constraint('Angle',iarc,angle))

# angle between lines
Sketch.addConstraint(Sketcher.Constraint('Angle',iline1,pointpos1,iline2,pointpos2,angle))

# angle-via-point (no helper constraints are added automatically when from python)
Sketch.addConstraint(Sketcher.Constraint('AngleViaPoint',icurve1,icurve2,geoidpoint,pointpos,angle))

where:

• Sketch is a sketch object
• iline, iline1, iline2 are integers specifying the lines by their ordinal numbers in Sketch.
• pointpos1, pointpos2 should be 1 for start point and 2 for end point. The choice of endpoints allows to set internal angle (or external), and it affects how the constraint is drawn on the screen.
• geoidpoint and pointpos in AngleViaPoint are the indexes specifying the point of intersection.
• angle is the angle value in radians. The angle is counted between tangent vectors in counterclockwise direction. Tangent vectors are pointing from start to end for the lines (or vice versa if ending point is supplied in angle between lines mode), and along counterclockwise direction for circles, arcs and ellipses. Quantity is also accepted as an angle (e.g. App.Units.Quantity('45 deg'))