Mechanism Design and Mechanism Dynamics > Mechanism Design > Creating Mechanism Models > Modeling Entities > Belts and Pulleys > To Create a Belt and Pulley System
  
To Create a Belt and Pulley System
1. With a mechanism assembly open, click . The Belt tab opens.
2. Click References and select the surfaces, edges, or connections on which to wrap the belt. To select two references, press and hold CTRL. A green line, indicating the belt path, appears in the graphics window. You can change the path as follows:
Click to toggle the side the belt wraps around the pulley.
Click the up or down arrows to change the order of the pulley in the belt path.
 
* Click the appropriate drag handles to flip the wrap side or to change the wrap order.
3. After you set the path, you can select a surface for the Belt Plane.
 
* It is not usually necessary to define the belt plane, as this is an automatic feature. However, if the selected surface is not the one that you are looking for, you can manually select another surface.
4. Click Options to define or edit the pulley connection. By default, if no bodies conflict, the pulley pin or cylinder connection is defined as the Pulley Body, while the second body is defined as the Carrier Body.
To reverse body roles, click . Bear in mind that this may result in a body conflict across pulleys.
Enter a value for the Number of wraps around the pulley. The default value is 1.
Click Next Connection to browse and select a set of pin or cylinder connections for the pulley. This option is available only when the pulley reference is geometrical (surface, edge or curve) and when the body containing this reference has more than one valid pulley connection.
 
* Click the appropriate drag handle to set the number of wraps around the pulley.
5. Click to activate the unstretched belt length collector. Enter a value or select a value from the list of most recently used values. Once you activate the unstretched belt length, the value becomes a constraint which must be satisfied during the connection process.
6. Click to define the belt stiffness.
7. Click to preview the new system, and then click to close.