Why "hinged" object gets distorted when placed inside another object?

Hi, so I have a 'hinge" door-like object, and it works fine when it's outside the "supporting" object, but if I place it inside the supporting object then the hinged object gets all distorted... I tried all kinds of stuff but could not get it to keep its shape as I rotated its pivot... (see images)

Appreciate any help! :)

Screen Shot 2020-05-17 at 10.23.12 PM.png


Screen Shot 2020-05-17 at 10.24.13 PM.png
 
Make sure your objects are 1:1:1 in scale to avoid shearing which is crucial in hierarchies. Use coord system tool to reset and height/width/length for proportions next time.

Cheers
Frank
 
Thanks Frank... I hadnt realized I needed to make the objects editable, once I did that I was able to burn-transform the objects to 1:1:1 scale

Thanks!
 
* It is the functional essence of a hierarchy that properties of parental objects are inherited by the children nodes.
1 You can use a group, consisting of base plate and hinged attachment on the same level (ie no hierarchy) and this will work.
2 You can apply a burn transform (as per Frank) to reset the parameters to the original values.
3 Preferable, ignore the scale parameters (again, as per Frank) and use the Width/Height/Length parameters. Of course, this only works with cuboid primitives. For others (sphere / torus / ...) you can deploy a transform modifier. Toggle this off in the object browser if you need to tweak the primary settings. No need for an object to be editable, you can stick with parametric primitives out of the box.

* There is an indication of the shear-status by the transform widget being distorted as you can see in your screen shot. You get instant feed back from the GUI that the axes of the current sub-object (the hinged plate) are not orthogonal / perpendicular but sheared. Rotation on a pivot generates acute / obtuse angles in most degrees of rotation.
* If you know what you are doing, you can use this shearing for rather weird animated distortions. This is quite useful in biology for cheap tricks.
* Note that any such distortion is also passed on to any modifiers in the hierarchy.
 
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