BLACK-CAD V20 Ported to ZWCAD 2020: 3D Unfolding Made Easy

GUANGZHOU, CHINA: January 17, 2020 – The exciting story unfolds: you can now transform 3D objects into planes on ZWCAD 2020 with BLACK-CAD V20! This specialized add-on is developed by ANTARES^®, a trusted German software provider and well received by plumbers, shipbuilders, model manufacturers, etc.

Gone was the Cut-and-try Method

As we all know, bodies like elbows, boat frames and canopies are made out of metal sheets, wooden plates or fabric panels. Manufacturers need to cut the raw materials before bending, edging, soldering, welding or gluing the parts. And before the cutting can start, an accurate drawing containing the necessary unfolded and equal-area projection of a 3D surface must be there.

However, bodies, especially the ones with complicated surfaces, such as rotating surfaces, screw surfaces and other free-form surfaces are usually difficult to unfold. Since traditional drawing tools that generate 2D cutting sheets represent a great expenditure of time and materials, precise drawings are vital to a high level of productivity.

The Key to a Competitive Edge

Today, handicraftsmen or manufacturers can no longer afford the processes of trial and error. What is the way out then? The routines of BLACK-CAD that run under CAD platforms can help. With the linear-conform upper and lower edges of the surface to be unfolded, and the position of a welding seam defined in the 3D model, you can easily get the 2D cutting sheets of very complex bodies.

You can also generate connected 3D polylines by joining any linear objects, such as 2D polylines, circular or elliptical arcs and helixes. Moreover, it’s possible to generate the unfolded surface area between two 3D polylines (even with holes or open linework, for example, patterns or letters) as the upper and lower edges for the surfaces to be unrolled, with the crease edges taken into consideration and without showing the bending lines.

You can even control the unrolling accuracy by setting the parameters.

Figure 1. Unfold a 3D tube with BLACK-CAD to see the size of the 2D cutting sheet

Unlocking the Add-on's Potential

BLACK-CAD has been serving and satisfying numerous producers from various industries for 3 decades. Church roofs, ships, tents… objects whose surfaces are bent have been designed and produced with the aid of this application.

Figure 2. View the curved surfaces from different angles with BLACK-CAD

Searching for CAD platforms where the add-on can better play its role, developers of BLACK-CAD regard ZWCAD as the exact platform they need. Its compatibility was the first point that crossed their mind and the last thing on their mind – all 3D geometries can be imported to ZWCAD and then unfolded. And apart from the intuitive interface and useful features, they thought well of its good performance in 3D construction.

Furthermore, direct and timely support offered by the ZWCAD technical team helped smooth the porting process in the VLISP environment. “We like the direct contact with the ZWCAD team. It is not so anonymous like with other vendors,” appreciated the software engineer, Dr. H-Joachim Schulz.

In brief, if unfolding 3D objects is part of your workflow, this accessible and affordable package is exactly what you need.

About ZWCAD

Developed by ZWSOFT CO., LTD.(Guangzhou), which has helped over 900,000 users from 90 countries create amazing things, ZWCAD is a powerful, reliable and DWG compatible CAD solution for worldwide users. Available in 15 languages, it provides innovative, collaborative and customizable features to designers and engineers in various industries such as AEC and MFG.