New person to solid works needing help

[jonkers]

As the topic says i am a new person needing help with solid works.

I have only been using it for a day or so and i got a grasp of the basics now and thought i would try and model something kinda simle that i thought i could do.

So i grabbed the thing closest to me and it happened to be the firing bolt out of my paintball marker.

Anyway i got what i consider something pretty good after a few hr's and was pretty happy with my first modeling attempt.

But there is one thing left to do and i can not for the life of me work it out.

I need to make an elliptical type shape dent in the side of it. I need it to gradually get deeper as it goes backwards along the bolt.

Any help[ with this would be great. If there is a tutorial that you know of that you could point me to or explain to me how to do it would be fantastic.

I have added a pic to try and show you what i mean.

 

[bcampbell]

I'd try and revolve a surface with the shape that you want, then cut the solid with the surface.

 

[phinneas55]

Exactly what I was thinking... or just do a revolve cut. Establishing the axis could be tricky, though.

You could also try a filled surface. Make a sketch tangent to the face of the cylinder and draw the of the elipse. Next, on a perpendicular plane, add a sketch point to guide how deep the cut should go into the part; then do a surface cut. Check out the SUFRACES tutorial on the SW help menu for more info.

Or mabye an INDENT feature could work?

 

[hooble]

Try sweeping an eliptical cut along an eliptical path.