Autodesk Inventor 2018 - Sheet Metal Rips

By Peter Maxwell-Stewart

This blog will show you how you can create different types of flat patterns using the rip command in Inventor 2018.I have made a lofted part using lofted flange in sheet metal, but the problem is I need to create a flat pattern of it so it can be manufactured. However, if we just hit flat pattern then the model just moves to look at one of the faceted faces but doesn’t actually flatten the part. Why? Well because it’s all one continuous piece of material. 

So, we need to use the rip command to add a rip or split line into the material.  Watch the video to see how to insert a rip into your parts and also how you can divide your flat pattern into small patterns by adding multiple rips. This is especially useful when the whole parts single flat pattern may be bigger than a sheet size.