EEE 113 – Engineering Graphics

Lab #3 – More Geometric Construction

The Cam-Follower Example

In this exercise more geometric construction techniques will be applied including internal and
external tangencies of circles, creating blocks, hatching, loading other linetypes, and modifying
and rotating blocks.

Part 1. Creating the cam and the follower

1. Start by opening a new file.

2. In the Select Template manager, left-mouse-click on the triangular button to the right of
the Open button, and select Open with no Template – Metric.

3. Set the default units to Millimeters.

4. Create two concentric circles with center at coordinates 0,0 and radii 20 and 40 mm. The
point with coordinates (0,0) corresponds to the center of rotation of the cam.
5. Create another circle with center at coordinates 0,75 and radius 20 mm.

6. In the pull-down menus, select:

[Draw] => [Circle] => [Tan,Tan,Radius]

7. At the prompt “Specify point on object for

first tangent of circle:” left-click the upper
circle at the approximate position of the
point of tangency.

8. At the prompt “Specify point on object for

second tangent of circle:” left-click the big
circle at the approximate location of the
point of tangency.

9. At the prompt “Specify radius of circle:”

type 100 [ENTER].

If the R00 circle created is on the wrong

side of the drawing (i.e., externally tangent
rather than internally tangent), repeat and
make sure that the cursor is positioned near
the center of the R100 circle to be drawn
when its radius is typed.

10. Create the other R100 tangent to the other side of the circles.

11. Trim entities in the drawing to create the cam as shown.

Before Trim After Trim

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 12. Construct the key way as shown. (Note:
Be careful in locating the horizontal line.)

You can first create a vertical line through

the center of the circles and offset this line
5 units to the right and to the left.

13. The next few steps will create a Block for the cam. A block is a set of entities that are
grouped together as a single object and assigned a name. Since all the entities created thus
far are parts of the cam, we will group them together into a block named “cam”.

14. In the Draw toolbar pick the Make Block command

icon. The Block Definition dialog box appears.

15. In the Block Definition

dialog box, enter “Cam”
as the name and
description.

16. Click on Select objects,

and make a window
around the cam to select
objects.

17. Click on Pick Point and

select the center of the
φ40 circle (center of the
cam) as the base point of
the block.

18. Click the OK button.

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 19. Create the “FOLLOWER” by drawing three
concentric circles with center at (0,120) and
radii 25, 12, and 5.

20. Create vertical arm attached to the follower.

The length of this arm is arbitrary.

21. Create the hatched follower guide as shown.

Its actual position is not important. Use the
Hatch command icon in the Draw toolbar.
Use Pattern ANSI133. Click the “Pick
Points” option to identify the area to be
hatched.

22. For the dashed lines, select [FORMAT] =>

[LINETYPE] from the pull-down menus,
and load the HIDDEN linetype.

23. Create a block for the follower. In the Draw

toolbar pick the Make Block command
icon. The Block Definition dialog box
appears.

24. Click on Select Objects, and make a

window around the follower as shown to
select objects.

25. Click on Pick Point and select the center of

the circles as the base point of the block.

26. Click the OK button.

27. Save the drawing as a:cam-follower.dwg.

Part 2. Rotating the cam

In this part of the exercise, the cam will be rotated 15° counterclockwise, and the follower will
drop an appropriate distance to stay tangent to the cam

1. Make a copy of the cam-follower assembly using the Copy Object command icon in the
Modify toolbar. Create a window around the drawing to select objects. Position the copy
to the right of the original drawing as shown.

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2. In the Modify toolbar, select the Rotate command icon.

3. At the prompt “Select objects:” left-mouse-click the cam in the copy

of assembly (the right figure).

4. Right-mouse-click to finish selection of objects.

5. Select center of the cam hole as the base point of rotation, and key-in
15 as the angle of rotation.

6. To find the final position of the cam, create a

circle of radius 45 whose center is the same as
that of the cam’s R20 arc.

7. Create a vertical line passing through the center

of the follower.

8. Select the Move command icon in the Modify

toolbar.

9. At the prompt “Select objects:” pick the

follower, then right-click to finish selection.

10. For base point, pick the center of the follower,

and pick the intersection of the circle and the
circle and the vertical line created in Step 5 as
the “second point of displacement”.
(Note: It might be necessary to zoom in on the
cam and use Snap Intersection to accurately
locate the new position of the follower.)

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 11. Extend the two vertical lines of the follower’s arm to extend to the follower’s new
position.

12. Save the drawing.

Part 3. Dropping the follower

In this part of the exercise, the follower will be dropped 20 mm, and the cam will rotate an
appropriate angle to stay tangent to the follower.

1. Make a copy of the cam-follower assembly using the Copy Object command icon in the
Modify toolbar. Create a window around the second drawing to select objects. Position
the copy to the right of the second drawing.

2. Select the Move command icon in the Modify toolbar.

3. Left-mouse-click the follower to select as the object to be moved, and right-mouse-click

to finish selection of objects.

4. Left-mouse-click the center of the follower as the base point.

5. At the prompt “Specify second point of displacement…” key in

@0,-20 [ENTER]

The above entry will specify a point of relative coordinates (0,-20) with respect to the
previous location of the center of the cam.

6. Extend the vertical arm of the follower to the new position of the follower.

At the final position, the R100 arc of the cam is externally tangent to the R25 of the
follower.

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 7. To find the new position of the center
of the right-side R100 arc of the cam,
construct the two circles shown as
dashed lines: one of radius 125 (25 +
100) and same center as that of the
φ50 circle of the follower, the other of
radius 60 (100 – 40) and the same
center as that of the cam’s point of
rotation.

8. To find the angle of rotation α of the

cam, construct two lines from the
center of rotation: one to the old
position of the center of R100, and the
other to its new position (the
intersection between the two circles
drawn in step 7.

9. Measure the angle α to five decimal places.

10. Rotate the cam by the angle α. The new position of the cam should be such that R100 is
tangent to the follower.

11. Save the drawing.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3