Contour — turn a drawn line into a solid strip

What does this tool do?

Contour turns a line drawn on one plane into a solid strip that follows it — with a thickness and width you choose. The original line is left untouched; the strip is created as its own group.

Use it when you need to:

• Quickly build battens, bands, or trims following a curve sketched on a board face.
• Turn a 2D outline (e.g. a decorative curve) into a 3D solid for joining/cutting.
• Extrude along a path without drawing a profile and running follow-me.

Basic steps

1. Click the Contour icon. (You can pre-select edges — the tool adopts that selection.)
2. Hover a line/edge: the whole connected edge run previews — the path in orange, the strip's band outline in cyan.
3. Click to build: the solid strip rises beside the line as a group named Contour. The status bar reports Built 1 contour strip(s).
4. Keep hovering and clicking other lines, or press Esc to exit.

Thickness / Width and typed input

Two HUD chips: Thickness (default 3 mm) and Width (default 6 mm).

• Tab – cycle the focused input between Thickness and Width.
• Type a number and press Enter – set the focused one.
• Type 3x6 – set both at once (thickness 3, width 6).
• Click a chip directly – open its input box.

Keyboard

• Tab – switch the Thickness/Width input.
• Type a number + Enter – set the focused size; 3x6 sets both.
• Esc – exit the tool.

Common problems

• “No usable line here…”: the line must lie flat on one plane — a run that wanders through 3D space cannot become a strip.
• “Could not build a strip from this line”: the line is too small for the strip size, or self-intersects — try a smaller Width or simplify the line.
• No preview when hovering: the tool only sees edges in the currently open context — if the line lives inside a group, open that group first (double-click it), then hover.
• Each built strip is its own Undo step (Ctrl+Z).