The .bcad file I am currently working on has mysteriously dissapeared. I saved the file every time before shutting down the program. The file still exists in the folder it is saved in, however, it won't open and the info box says there is 0 kb of data. Frustrated, as I am in the middle of the frame build and now don't have access to the design. Luckily I have the csv file of build specs, but I'm going to have to re-model my design if I want any visual reference. Not sure what happened, maybe someone has seen this before? I am running the linux version on a mac, 10.6.8. All of my other .bcad files are intact, showing 254 kb data in the info box, and are loading properly.
Thanks
I'm sorry to hear about this. I've saved a lot of BCAD files in my day, and I can't say this is a common occurance. I'm glad to know you at least have the CSV file. If you send me that, I can try to rebuild the BCAD file for you.
I generally expect most BikeCAD Pro users to do as you've done and store their designs on their own machines. However, there does seem to be a trend in general towards storing files in the cloud. BikeCAD does allow for this as explained at: bikecad.ca/opening_and_saving_online.
No worries, I will just rebuild it, shouldn't take too long. I have the data I need to keep building the frame. I do see why the cloud is gaining popularity, redundancy seems good in this case. A lesson learned.
So I was working on a design, and the display screen randomly just turned gray, bike disappeared, icons were visible until I clicked on one of them, then the utility bars turned gray also. File, edit options were invisible unless I rolled the arrow over thier location and they would light up. So, I decided to exit bike cad to reload the file. Upon exiting the program, it prompts you to save the file. I chose yes as I didnt want to lose any of the changes I had just made. Then I'm prompted to overwrite existing file, I choose yes as I always do and have done with no issue. Now, upon opening the file, I just get that gray screen. I have rebuilt my file so I can keep working on this frame, But I'm not sure what is causing this issue. ( I guess I didnt learn my lesson, as I did not have the file saved in the cloud.) I'm thinking now I should have not chosen to save the file and accepted the fact that I would have only lost the most recent changes instead of saving the file and locking in this gray screen as the current "design"...my OS and java are as updated as they can be for this computer, just trying to track down the cause here. Thanks again.
I'm sorry to hear about this. Please e-mail me your BCAD file, I've got my fingers crossed that I'll be able to recover the data and figure out what might have led to this situation.
email sent
I managed to recover the lost data from your file and found the issue. In the animated GIF below, you can see an extra tube has been added between the top tube and down tube. It looks like the model failed for you the instant this tube was added. Since you never had a chance to adjust it, I don't know exactly how you intended for this tube to be configured, so I've just placed it randomly between the top tube and down tube. As you can see, it is possible for a tube to be placed between the top tube and down tube. The problem with your model seems to be the top tube radius. The radius was set to 2050mm. Unfortunately, I don't know exactly why 2050mm seems to be a problem. That is a mystery I will have to investigate further. The model is sufficiently flexible to accommodate a variety of radii. As you can see below, things are fine at 1600mm, 1800mm, 2000mm. Even at 2100mm, we have a situation where the selected top tube radius is too big to fit in the space allocated. However, even there, the model doesn't actually "Fail". The range of problematic top tube radii in your model seems to be from around 2030mm up to around 2085mm. Any top tube radius bigger than 2085mm and any top tube radius smaller than 2030mm seems to be fine. It's just in that range between 2030mm and 2085mm where the model chokes.
Thanks for bringing this issue to my attention. It is my goal to make BikeCAD sufficiently robust that any combination of dimensions can be explored to create any design imaginable. I will continue to investigate what is going on with this range of dimensions.