I need help building ball and socket joints. Thus I need tutorials. Can any one help me. The 3d program I use is Sketch up. I did google this but got nada on it. Please and Thank you. Thank you for reading.
trial and error my friend. Basically what you are wanting is a guide on tolerances and sizes between the ball and socket. This is entirely dependent on what type of 3D printer you are using, and what material. Unless there is someone here is super duper nice, I think you are going to have a hard time getting this info because those people spent a lot of time and money making and printing different joints to see what works. If you spent several months and $50 or so figuring this out for yourself, would you just happily hand it over to someone? What i'm trying to say is experiment! try measuring existing ones, make several different sizes, and print them. it's hard to say exactly what to do since sometimes the difference in your model that makes it just right to not working is a thousandth of an inch (or 0.001"). Good luck!
I use Solidworks, and it has a function to help you but what I do is know the tolerances of the material/printer/method of creation, and upsize the ball to max out the range of tolerance. example: if your tolerance is .0125 then make the ball of the joint the size of the socket plus .0125 i have not done wrong with that. as far as a tutorial is concerned, I dont use the same software as you. but to draw a circle, center line it, and cut half of it off. select the half still there and revolve boss it around the center line. choose the axis and draw a circle then extrude from it your shaft, then is the ball part, the socket can be made in more than many ways depending on the shape you need. but quick make a ball the same way but oversize it then cut away the "open area" you need for shape and size then "shell" its a function in solidworks, the broken ball selecting the interior of the cut away section, you must know your tolerances.
