Description
This component lays out each face of a mesh as a set of tiles on a two dimensional plane adding annotated tabs. If faces are quads a crease line is added between the faces 2nd and 4th vertices to aid in bending. The 3rd vertex is rotated about this same axis to a position planar with the other 3. Developed for paper cut model fabrication, vertex normals are offset on the original mesh to define tabs which are shared between faces. Each placed tile is indexed according to its original mesh topology order and each tab is labeled with the index of the face it connects to, allowing for ease of re-assembly. The tile’s placement can be limited in height, allowing for sequential rows of limited height columns, aiding in the layout for fabrication. Tabs depth and edge beveling are variable and tabs can be removed from naked edge conditions. Mesh colors are inherited and transferred when applied to the input mesh.
Components
Fab Tab Tiles
| M | In | Mesh | Item | Open or closed mesh |
| D | In | Double | Item | The distance the tab edge is offset from the edge of the mesh face |
| T | In | Double | Item | A scalar value for the width of the offset edge tab |
| E | In | Boolean | Item | A boolean input which specifies if edge tabs will be added at naked edges |
| H | In | Double | Item | A distance cap placed on how many tiles can stack in the y direction before resetting a new row in the x direction. This is meant to aid with layout for fabrication |
| G | In | Double | Item | A distance value specifying a gap to be placed between flattened tiles to avoid overlap |
| clr | In | Color | Item | An optional input that overrides the tab edge color when the mesh contains vertex colors |
| M3d | Out | Mesh | Tree | A 3d representation of the mesh with triangulation and tabs |
| C3D | Out | Point 3d | Tree | A datatree of the center points of the new 3D face centers |
| M2D | Out | Mesh | Tree | A datatree of the flattened mesh faces with tabs with one new branch of the datatree per tile |
| NE | Out | Polyline | Tree | A datatree of the cut, or naked edge of the 2d mesh tiles with one new branch of the datatree per tile |
| SE | Out | Line | Tree | A datatree of the seam edges between the tab and face of the 2d mesh tiles with one new branch of the datatree per tile |
| CE | Out | Line | Tree | A datatree of the crease lines along the quad faces with one new branch of the datatree per tile. |
| FC_PLN | Out | Plane | Tree | A datatree of the plane of each faces oriented at the incenter and aligned with the tiles edge to be used for placement of text objects labeling the face index |
| FC_TXT | Out | String | Tree | A datatree of the index of each face |
| FC_HGT | Out | Double | Tree | A double value of the suggested height for the text of each face to keep it within outline |
| TB_PLN | Out | Plane | Tree | A datatree of the plane of each faces oriented at the center of and aligned to the edge tabs to be used for placement of text objects labeling the adjacent face index the tile is to connect to |
| TB_TXT | Out | String | Tree | A datatree of index value of the tile to which each edge tab is to be connected |
Downloads
Minimum Requirements
| Platform | Rhino 5, Grasshopper |
| Version | Grasshopper 0.9.0075 |
| Type | C# Component |