Stitch hole creation and spacing

[jadeseven]

G'day mates,

Im new to CAD. I have designed some products on QCAD and would like to know if someone will kindly tell me how to create stitch holes. It seems that I can make little dots but I don't want to have to do each dot one by one on each patterns as that will take ages. Is there a short cut? And how can I make the stitch holes the same spacing/distance from each other, say if I needed to make five stitches per inch throughout, how would I do this? I SO very much appreciate any help.

Many kind regards,
JD

[clive]

G'day mates,

Im new to CAD. I have designed some products on QCAD and would like to know if someone will kindly tell me how to create stitch holes. It seems that I can make little dots but I don't want to have to do each dot one by one on each patterns as that will take ages. Is there a short cut? And how can I make the stitch holes the same spacing/distance from each other, say if I needed to make five stitches per inch throughout, how would I do this? I SO very much appreciate any help.

Many kind regards,
JD

Hello JD and welcome.

Question -are these simple designs i.e. using "straight" lines or arcs and circles etc...?

[clive]

Hi jadeseven

In version 3 RC2 or 3 (for windows) there is a little more on offer! In the Point Tools (WP) there is an option (N Points on Line) to specify how many points to place on a given line. So for example you could start off by drawing a horizontal line say 25mm long, then by using the "Points on line" tool you could place 5 no. reference points on your line -thus giving you 5 equal points (stitches if you like) along a your 1 inch line (25mm).

From here you could place "proper" circles of say 0.25 or 0.5mm radius on these equal "reference" points to represent your stitches.
.....*Note to change the line weight of entities like lines,circles etc. use the property editor > Menu > View > Tool bars and "tick" property editor. Do the same to view layer list and Blocks list, you can then "dock" these inside or on top of one another on the right hand side of your window! The command line can also be "docked" in this way too!

Then quite simply delete the original line and your points to leave 5 equally spaced holes in a 1 inch (25mm) line!

Next you could create a block from this line of holes and save it and insert and copy and paste as many as you need along your pattern.

The only thing is - this is OK for straight lines but for Arcs, curves circles etc, this would need some more working on.

Alternatively you could just place "Points" where you need them around the Arcs, curves etc -then copy/paste the circles around your pattern, but of course like you say this would take a while to do.

If you find you are using the same size shapes, curves, Arcs etc.. then creating blocks and inserting, copying/pasting them is the way to go.

Hope this helps you and prompts you in the right direction.

Anyways this may help you in the right direction

[andrew]

jadeseven: Interesting problem. With QCAD 3 scripting it would be relatively easy to create a tool that converts all selected lines / arcs into evenly spaced 'stitch holes' with a given stitch size and spacing. If stitches have to match up at corners, it's a bit more tricky.

Alternatively, the tool that clive mentioned could be improved to offer an option for 'as many points as needed with a fixed distance between points'.

How should this be visualized in the end? Just points with a certain distance or potentially also short lines with length A and spacing B?

[clive]

jadeseven: Interesting problem. With QCAD 3 scripting it would be relatively easy to create a tool that converts all selected lines / arcs into evenly spaced 'stitch holes' with a given stitch size and spacing. If stitches have to match up at corners, it's a bit more tricky.

Alternatively, the tool that clive mentioned could be improved to offer an option for 'as many points as needed with a fixed distance between points'.

How should this be visualized in the end? Just points with a certain distance or potentially also short lines with length A and spacing B?

Andrew - I think if the points on line tool could be improved to offer points with a certain distance between points but also be able to "follow" if you like the path of an arc or any given curve that would probably do. Because with a little bit of thought you could change it as you go to suit and match your lines , Arcs etc..
This certainly would make for a "nifty" feature to have in this tool set.

[andrew]

Feature requests:

http://www.ribbonsoft.com/bugtracker/in ... ask_id=502
http://www.ribbonsoft.com/bugtracker/in ... ask_id=503