SquarePeg-RoundHole-Hinge : Testing With Autodesk Inventor

I first saw this type of hinge on the Epilog Laser site, and I've been using it for some of my projects.

I'm going from CorelDraw to Autodesk Inventor to minimize the prototyping time when I design a new box.

A valuable technique I've been able to use is making the box top rotate around the box bottom to see how my drawings may need to be tweaked.

I've added a video of my ultimate goal here in Step 1 and also in Step 13.

I do my work at TechShop in San Jose...

Thank you for the Inventor insight, Mauricio!

I built an assembly for the box bottom and one for the box top.

Here's a shot of them separated in space from one another.  To get them to align in the previous image, I set flush constraints around the box sides, then set a temporary mate constraint for the front edges on the top and bottom of the box that will touch one another.

The second image shows the box top and box bottom together with this temporary constraint.

On the back component of the top, I created a fresh sketch.   This went on the square peg, facing the side of the box.

I put some construction lines in this fresh sketch to find the center of the square - this will serve as the point to place the axis.

In Ribbon: Sketch -> Draw -> Point

This goes at the center pont of the square face.

In the Ribbon:   Work Features -> Axis

It took me a bit of time to get comfortable with this, but a constraint can be placed on objects that do not intersect.   I eventually realized that with a parallel constraint, this is a common occurrence.


Constrain the hinge axis to the inner surface of the ring.

In the ribbon:  Constrain ->  Mate

Without contact settings, the box top will be able to rotate through the box bottom when you drag the top with the cursor - not possible in any reality I've ever known...

The video will show how this looks.

I will next set up the parameters to make the box act like a real box...

In the browser, I right-click the box bottom assembly, then select the Contact Set option.  The short video shows this step.

This will allow the box top to stop when it rotates open and intersects the back face of the box bottom.

Right-click the part -> Component -> Promote

The video shows these steps.

A pop-up warning shows, but I accepted okay and the part gets promoted.

Right-click this promoted part -> Contact Set

This will allow the box top to stop when it rotates shut and intersects the front face of the box bottom.

Right-click the part -> Component -> Promote

The video shows these steps.

A pop-up warning shows, but I accepted okay and the part gets promoted.  There's a video coming up when setting this on the front face of the box top.

Right-click this promoted part -> Contact Set

In the browser,  a new icon has appeared in front of the promoted parts and the box bottom assembly we've enabled for Contact Set.

This step is needed to make the box top stop when it hits the box bottom.

On the Ribbon:  Inspect -> Interference -> Activate Contact Solver

See the video...

Thank you for checking-in!  I hope this helps some of yáll folks!