♦ Curved (Rolled Sheet Steel) Decorative Balcony Designs that Mimic Wrought Iron Fabrication
♠ How to: Wrap Flat Extrusion Onto Curved Face in SolidWorks
♣ Balcony Assembly Shop Prints & Renderings
♥ FEA Simulation Safety Test: Deck Loaded for Weight (Go to the balcony FEA post)
Balcony: An Origin Story
- I was asked to design a set of balconies to match 2 different french door openings on 2 different landings for a residence.
- This was planned to be just a set of 2 balconies for a residence, so they were fabricated from steel for convenience of materials on hand.
- The balconies are very similar, just different widths on the deck subweldments, which drives several other changes in miter angles, front rail curve radii, and corresponding changes to the size of decorative faux wrought iron inserts to make up the differences.
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Sketch Entities
I was given this image as an example of what was wanted for style.
- You can see in this image that it’s a “Juliet Balcony“, usually meaning it’s merely for window or door decoration, and not an actual deck for standing on (because it doesn’t have a deck, or its deck doesn’t have enough room for feet).
- This one has various acanthus leaves that weren’t included in my design, although I like the way they look. I assumed both that we’d leave out the stuff we’re not experts on, and those involved in fabrication of this project are not blacksmiths.
- After typing it out, I regret not sourcing them before, I suppose the leaves could be ordered from somewhere and welded on…
- You’ll notice some smaller scrolled heart-shaped pieces in the center that I call the “medallion”. We did something different and more personalized here.
Drawing Print
Here’s the layout print (PDF) for the 104″ x 32″ balcony.
Don’t I Know You?
Depending on how you’ve come upon this post, some of you may be a balcony aficionados, nay experts. And some may have seen a balcony that looks very similar to the faux wrought iron decorative insert shown. So let me be upfront in saying that much of it was, uh… very inspired by… the photo of a Juliet balcony that can be found on a Google Images search for “Balcony”.
Just Following Orders
At first, because handcrafted ironwork is not my forte, I just copied much of the perceived geometry of this balcony photo’s front insert. I planned on changing it later – after I had the functionality worked out I could change the decorative patterns enough to be authentic.
I don’t want to infringe ruthlessly on intellectual property, but who actually owns the IP? What if it’s a timeless or “free use” architectural theme, as patentable as a Doric column? If someone showed me a picture of the Washington Monument and said they want a yard ornament designed after it, I wouldn’t have to pay royalties to ancient Egypt for copying the shape of an obelisk.
Everybody’s Doing It
This whole line of “Maybe I don’t have to change it” thinking came from trying to find pictures of the balcony online. I found the same exact image 3 different times on 3 different corporate websites from 3 different continents! Asia (China), North America (Canada), and Europe/Asia (Turkey). See the screenshots below. So if so many different ironworks companies purport to sell the same product, have they all licensed the design (and same exact image, for marketing), or is this an “open source” design that no one can claim ownership of? Until further notice, I no longer feel compelled to change the decorative insert design, especially since these are a one-off set of furniture, not a production run.
If you’re the actual artist or design owner, let me know, and if you want changes. As of the writing of this post, the balconies have not actually been finished nor installed, they’re just a collection of parts for a project that gets talked about being finished every so often. I would like to know where your design came from, and what you think of how it’s made its way around the world.
Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery
As mentioned, I found no fewer than 3 businesses from 3 continents, posting the same photo to their websites, all claiming to sell the same balcony.
Sherlock Homes Furnishings
This print was found on the Canadian site, and it’s the only fabrication print I’ve found for this balcony, which in my mind adds a modicum of legitimacy to the Canadian firm’s ownership of the photo and design. Although it is apparently just a phone camera snapshot of some print, and therefore of questionable origin.
Notice that the balcony in the print is not curved, to match the photo. Maybe they roll it after this weld step? But if those little side rails are welded on, that would be hard to roll, let alone have an angle true to the facade of the building. In other words, maybe this is just their version of copying aspects of the pretty internet picture as I have done?
These guys in China went so far as to watermark the image with their Alibaba store URL. Does this prove they’re the originators of the photograph and design?
Not sure what Jumba Bars are, but there’s that photograph again. This time you can order it from Turkey.
How To Wrap a Sketch in SolidWorks, to Extrude a Curved Railing
Here’s how I did it, anyway. Realize this model was started over 3 years ago from the date of this post’s publishing. I would probably do things differently today, including using the Weldment multibody part file and more “Direct Editing” features, like “Delete Bodies” instead of “Cut Extrude”-ing solids out of existence. But I pulled this file out of the Dusty Old CAD File Shelf and here’s what it is.
The “Missing Link” in My CAD Modeling Style Historical Record.
When I first started modeling in SolidWorks, everything I did was always “Bottom-Up,” creating part files and adding them to assembly files. Sometimes sketches in an assembly file would be a guide or “skeleton”, but anything that created external references was forbidden.
In this section I will blather on about myself, detailing the minutiae of obscure topics with narrow appeal.
I’ve since got into the serious time savings of multibody “Top-Down” part modeling. But before then, this balcony file is sort of a “missing link” in my modeling style evolution, as it’s not exactly a SolidWorks “Multibody Part” nor a “Weldment” file (files made to provide ease of design, fast changeability, with good fit-up dependencies, yet be easily split out into *.sldprt files that Manufacturing and Assembly can best handle).
You can see the driving geometry dimensions behind these balcony subassemblies are at the part document level. Many parts can have their geometry changed just by updating one sketch’s dimensions (you guys who’ve done weldment files for many years get it). Most assembly parts are derived from just a couple different part files. The parts (deck grate, upper railing, lower railing, front skirt, side skirt, etc.) appear and disappear according to Configurations which suppress or unsupress features.
Again, I used suppressed features per configurations in a regular part file to create multiple individual piece parts to save out instead of organizing a weldment part file’s cut list of “bodies” into subweldments and either saving them out and/or suppressing them per configurations that are subassemblies, collections of parts, or subweldments. This was my transitional version of Top-Down modeling, the point at which I went from ONLY bottom-up part creation to eventually learning more about how to use the top-down tools in the SolidWorks platform.
I will name this CAD file “Lucy,” as I was listening to the Beatles when I unearthed it.
The funny part is that it’s almost like going full circle, as the 3D CAD platform I taught myself on was SketchUp, and everything was a top-down exercise in that program, at least for me.
Renderings
These renderings are all done in wacky or light colors because a few test renderings I did in the planned dark brown powdercoat are difficult to make out. The light colors provide better composition of the rendered image, easier to see the parts.
Note on Render 5: This is just the *.png version (cropped) of the next renderings (Render 6 & Render 7), but missing the pitch black background and reflection. I assume it is a bug or quirk with SolidWorks 2015 PhotoView 360 that some scenes will not appear when saved as PNG. But if I save the same rendering out as JPG, it appears as previewed on the screen.
