Part VII: Working with Specialized Functionality
FIGURE 29.36Using the Flatten Bends feature
Process Bends feature
The Process Bends feature takes all the Flat Pattern information, the bend information, and entities
in the Flat Sketch, and rebuilds the model with the formed bends. The Flat Sketch under the
Process Bends feature is the Insert Bends method version of a sketched bend. You can add sketch
lines here to bend panels of the part. After you add lines to this sketch, exiting the sketch causes
the part to be created with a default 90-degree bend corresponding to the line. Of course, all the
Sketched Bend rules exist, such as that the line has to extend at least up to the edges of the part,
the lines cannot extend across multiple faces, and construction lines are ignored.
For every bend created by a sketch line in the Process Bends Flat Sketch, a Flat Bend feature is
added to the list under Process Bends. You can control the angle and radius of each of these Flat
Bends by editing the Flat Bend feature. This is all illustrated in Figure 29.37.No Bends feature
You use the No Bends tool on the Sheet Metal toolbar to roll back the model before the Flatten
Bends feature in the tree with a single button click. This is primarily to add new geometry that is
turned into bends through the Flatten and Process Bends features.Flat Pattern feature
The Insert Bends method uses the Flat Pattern feature as well as the Base Flange method. However,
it was not part of the original scheme, and was added at some point after the new tools had proved
their value. This enables you to make use of the new features as well, as discussed later in this
chapter in the section on mixing methods.