Part Orientation In Fusion 360 | Four Ways To Do It

Part Orientation in Fusion 360 is a common question that people ask me. Here are four ways to achieve this.
WATCH NEXT: How to use this channel • Channel Welcome | How ...
First, preparation. There is a setting in preferences - we’ll cover that quickly - and then we’ll choose the orientation that we prefer before we start. Then we can work out which of the reference planes will be the best one to choose for our first sketch. Second, even if we get that wrong we can use the move tool to put it where we want it, and even rotate it as we like. Third, there is an Align tool which can also be used to set the orientation of the part. Fourthly, when it comes to assembling our parts together we can use joints to move parts into position.
Eventually you will know which option is most suitable for your purpose and knowing about all of them will allow you to make your informed choice.
Buy Me a Coffee buymeacoffee.com/arnoldrowntree
Patreon / arnoldteaching
Chapters
0:00 Introduction
0:30 Preferences ‘Z up’
1:38 Sketch plane
2:25 The Move tool
3:55 The Align tool
5:05 Smoko
5:30 Joints - rigid
7:16 Joints - slider
8:05 Joints - revolute
10:00 Joints - animate
Fusion 360 beginners start here with a series of 16 basic tutorials:-
• Fusion 360 Basic Tutor...

[@jamesrayner8337]

I found this reallly useful, thanks.

[@htillotson1]

Thank you Arnold! As a beginner in Fusion 360 nothing moves/orients the way you want it so these few little tips make a HUGE difference. I spend way too much time trying to get my parts oriented in a way that makes sense to me.

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

I'm glad it helps Holly, I kept telling people not to worry but its easy enough to fix this. And what are you doing with Fusion 360?

[@htillotson1]

@@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360 Well, after your 16 part course I designed a small platform to hold a water reservoir bottle onto a stainless steel "wet" table. I"m a vet and we use a wet table for dental procedures. I also designed knobs for a old set of drawers my father built 40 years ago. It was built for his workshop to hold various nails, screws etc. He used small round headed screws for drawer pulls and after 40 years they needed an upgrade. So, now there are knobs held on with small bolts. Nothing astounding but I love the fact that I can take a concept, design it in Fusion 360 and then print out the completed part! Very cool....thank you again Arnold for your videos!

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

Thankyou for sharing Holly, that's encouraging, I hope you'll find plenty more of those 'small' uses for your new skill. Watch for my upcoming content, I have a few items coming about 3D printing.

[@georgeb9256]

Thank you Arnold, another very informative video! Would like to see one( maybe there is one already! ) showing how to modify an existing sketch and adding another component correctly oriented to the original. I keep getting mixed up with which plane I should be in! ( if you can understand what I mean !!!)

[@jim-stacy]

could not agree more, thanks arnold

[@BrianSmith-le6uy]

Love your videos, im much better on fusion 360 because of you! Thanks

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

Good on you Brian, keep learning and making.

[@channelvr1293]

nice to see you back.....lockdown so i got time to learn again.....bring it on ;-)

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

Thanks CVR, I'm pedalling. Actually there's one thing I want to experiment with down the track with VR/AR and that's free body diagrams superimposed on video of a mechanism. Another would be examining engineering simulation results in a walkthrough.

[@channelvr1293]

@@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360 actually have been thinking of that for a while but lack of time and experience keeps me away....thinks like fixing stuff where the AR glasses tell you where to unscrew things in real time....tricky..

[@AntiVaganza]

Thanks for this trick, much needed. Now, a plea: I know this is an old video and you might have gotten one by now, but please, please get a pop filter for your mic. You are obviously and rightfully so very close to the mic, but the pops are fairly frustating;) Anyhow, the content is solid!

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

Yes, got it AV. I've got a lavalier currently and gradually learning how to use audio better. I'm a slow learner.

[@MatthewPolack]

Thanks Arnold...I have a mock up 'granny flat' building with multiple sketches and bodies..which I built on the wrong ground plane...I can rotate the sketches...I can rotate the bodies...but for some reason when I rotate them..they don't end up joined together anymore...ie. I just want all the sketches and bodies to rotate together. Having trouble getting any of these methods to work! Shall keep trying!

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

Hi Matthew, Fusion 360 isn’t the first choice for building design but you can certainly do it. At first hearing of your problem I’d ask if you’re aware of Boolean operations? Do you need to keep the bodies separate for some reason or would it be OK to unite them into one? A single body might be good for a schematic design of the building but when you’re moving toward construction documents you would likely need an assembly.

[@MatthewPolack]

@@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360 Thanks Arnold..I ended up posting on the Autodesk forum and found the simplest method was just to rotate the view cube to a new front face! It's doing the job for the building plan...could use Sketchup or something..but I just know the Fusion workflow better for a quick job. Hope you are well! Thanks!

[@riccodelestaque7720]

I should have watched this video a long time ago, it will solve a lot of my building problems.

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

There is always a lot to learn, take your time and enjoy the journey.

[@user-yk1cw8im4h]

would've been better if you provide the models, especially the shaft one

[@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360]

E W you can get the models from the same place I got them, the indexing wheel is the same one I used in the intermediate series of tutorials. That shaft is so simple its three minutes work even for a beginner. Here's the intermediate playlist kzbin.info/aero/PLFCTgdiT5-kJErMn7E3Cq9gaaoeQg9NTf

[@user-yk1cw8im4h]

@@ArnoldRowntreeTeachesFusion360 Thanks, but it's just more convenient to have it linked in the description like most tutorials on youtube. Might be useful for people like me who didn't keep my indexing wheel model...

[@sandeepsachan-cnctrainer5573]

Hello

[@user-yk1cw8im4h]

hi