Flattening Sheet Metal Bends

You can flatten the bends in a sheet metal part in the following ways:

  • To flatten the entire part, if the Flat-Pattern1 feature is present, unsuppress Flat-Pattern1, or click Flatten Tool_Flatten_Sheet_Metal.gif on the Sheet Metal toolbar.
    The bend lines are shown by default when you unsuppress Flat-Pattern1. To hide the bend lines, expand Flat-Pattern1, right-click Bend-Lines, and select Hide.
    When you flatten the entire part in this manner, corner treatments are applied to create a clean, flattened sheet metal part.
  • To flatten the entire part, if the Process-Bends1 feature is present, suppress Process-Bends1, or click Flatten Tool_Flatten_Sheet_Metal.gif on the Sheet Metal toolbar.
  • To flatten one or more individual bends, add an Unfold Tool_Unfold_Sheet_Metal.gif feature.
    For faster system performance, only unfold the bends that you need for the task that you are performing. For example, when you add a cut across a bend, only unfold that one bend.

Using Corner Treatments

When you flatten a sheet metal part by unsuppressing the Flat-Pattern feature, corner treatments are automatically applied to create a clean, flattened sheet metal part. The corner treatments are applied so the flat pattern is correct for manufacturing.

shm_flat_pattern1.gif
Model with a miter flange
shm_flat_pattern2.gif shm_flat_pattern3.gif
Flattened model without a corner treatment (using the Unfold Tool_Unfold_Sheet_Metal.gif feature) Flattened model with a corner treatment

To turn off corner treatments:

  1. In the FeatureManager design tree, right-click Flat-Pattern1, and select Edit Feature.
  2. In the PropertyManager, clear Corner treatment.