AutoCAD Tutorial 12: Project One - Creating a Pencil

This is going to be our first actual project; in it we will be making a pencil. We will be using most of the skills we learnt in my past AutoCAD tutorials. However, I will try to make this tutorial as short and simple as I can.

Firstly select the “Frustum Cone” tool from the modelling tab at the tool palette:

This tool is a little shortcut for making a cone with a flat top. Now click anywhere on the drawing and input 10 for the base radius and press ENTER:

And for the top radius, input 4 and press ENTER:

Lastly, for the height input 20 and press ENTER:

This is what we should have so far, a nice cone with a flat top:

Next select the cone tool in the 3D make control panel:

Move your mouse towards the center of the first cone that we just finished making and using the center snap (which should be activated automatically) click at the center of the first cone's top:

For the base radius of this cone that we are creating, enter in for and press ENTER:

And the height, we will make it 14. So input 14 and press ENTER:

This is what we should have so far:

Let's move aside that for a moment and create another part of the pencil. There are 3 parts to this model, the pencil tip, body and the end. Once we create all 3 we will then put them together.

Moving on, select the polygon tool in the draw tab at the tool palette:

For the number of sides, input 6 and press ENTER:

Now click anywhere to the right of the pencil tip and select “Inscribed in circle” when the options come up:

For the radius of the circle in the polygon, enter in 10 and press ENTER:

Now select the press pull tool or type in “_presspull” and click inside of the 2D hexagon we just made:

Now enter in 100 for the height and press ENTER:

This is what we should have so far:

Now it's time to create the last piece of the model. Select the cylinder tool and to the right of the hexagon we previously made click and input 10 for the base radius and press ENTER:

For the height, input 20 and press ENTER:

Now we have an end, all we need to do is create the rubber on the end. Select the cylinder tool again and look for the center snap on top of the cylinder we just created and click on it:

For the base radius, input 9 and press ENTER:

For the height, input 10 and press ENTER:

Select the fillet tool from the modify tab at the tool palette:

Now input “t” for trim and press ENTER:

Select “Trim” if it isn't already selected and press ENTER:

Now select the edge of the last cylinder we just created:

For the fillet radius input 3 and press ENTER:

Press enter again since it asks for an edge and we already selected one:

Now we have a nice rounded off cylinder:

Now that we have all 3 pieces of our model, we are going to do some assembling. First though draw 2 lines which join 2 points that are opposite each other on top of the hexagon tower so that they intersect, forming a middle point:

Back to the pencil tip, activate the 3D move tool and select both cones of the pencil tip and press ENTER:

Adjust the view using the constrained orbit so that you can see the bottom of the pencil tip. Then move your mouse so it snaps with the center snap of the bottom cone and click:

Now the pencil tip should be moving with your mouse now. While it is, use the pan and constraint orbit tool to adjust your view again to view the top of the hexagon tower. When you have finished adjusting your view, press ESCAPE on the keyboard. Doing so stops your current action and since you are still using the 3D move tool, you resume using it again. Now click at the intersection point where the 2 lines on the hexagon tower cross.

Now it should look like this:

As you can see, the pencil tip is bigger than the hexagon tower. We will fix that with the slice tool. Now activate the slice tool (you may need to click on the double arrow to expand the 3d make section to see it):

This tool lets us slice objects. Firstly specify the object we are going to slice by clicking on it and pressing ENTER, in this case it is the lower cone of the pencil tip:

Now click at one of the points on the hexagon tower to be like a starting point: