We’ve reached the final step in designing the rubber grip for an air hockey paddle. The rubber grip is currently a solid mass that passes right through the handle of the air hockey paddle, which you can see if you view the paddle from below. We need to remove the excess material from the rubber grip so that it can slide over the plastic paddle.
If we subtract the paddle geometry as it stands now, it will only remove a thin shell from the rubber grip because the paddle is hollow on the inside (from the shell operation we performed previously).
Since we want to move the inner material as well, we need to create temporary solids for the subtraction operation. To make it as easy as possible, I set the 0 layer current and turned off the Rubber layer. Then I drew a solid cylinder and sphere (modeling panel of the Home tab) by snapping to the center and quadrants of the existing geometry.
Turning on the Rubber layer and turning off the Plastic layer, we’re ready to subtract! If you view the model from an isometric viewpoint you can easily select the appropriate geometry. Select the Subtract tool from the Solid Editing panel of the Home tab and then select the rubber grip as the object you want to subtract from. Don’t forget to press enter to end the first selection set (the objects you want to subtract from). Then use implied windowing (left to right) to select the cylinder and sphere that you want to subtract from the rubber grip.
Ta-dah… A composite shape with both style and precision!
To better visualize how the rubber grip and plastic air hockey paddle work together, turn on the Plastic layer and move the paddle down the Z-axis.
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