Copy Geom Skeletons

Forum|Forum|14 years ago
May 17, 2012
12 replies
5914 views

Looking for the Proe/Cons of copy geom features in skeletons.

Cons I have experienced:
My experience of routing cables on copy geometry, even independent has not
seemed worth the drawbacks.
Not able to duplicate objects, components replaced in asm's do not update.
Even the geom independent function
keeps the global ref.

Pros
very quick way to route cables
Chance of a duplicate objects is probably slim

The skeletons I create are always independent surfaces etc. years of
surfacing experience, no big deal to thrown in surfs.

Looking for opinions, generally what are the majority using out there

Douglas K. Bowles
Advanced Systems Harn/Des
520-665-7082 Office
520-490-9395 Cell
-

PRIVACY ACT NOTICE: This communication may contain privileged or other
Official information. If you are not the intended recipient or believe
that you have received this communication in error, please reply to the
sender indicating that fact and delete the copy you received. It is a
violation of Federal Law to print, copy, retransmit, disseminate, or
otherwise use this information without prior authorization.

Routed Syst. Design

Show previous replies

B

BrianMartin

13-Aquamarine

Hi Scott and Sun (and everyone else)...

I went off to grab some documents and videos and put them together for this reply. Then, work rained down on me from out of the blue. I didn't want to leave you hanging but I also didn't have a chance to put together the kind of response I wanted to.

So I'll have to give you a quick version...

* Make datums in your harness assembly.

* Manage your references to limit or eliminate external references

* SKETCH YOUR CABLE PATHWAYS USING REGULAR CREO (or Pro/E) SKETCHES

* Route your network using the vertices of the sketches as references.

* Use a logical reference file and autoroute! Even if you don't have Creo Schematics it's super easy to generate a neutral wire file from Excel or other sources

I am meticulous about creating my networks. If you make multiple short segments, you can run harnesses perfectly straight. None of that annoying spline behavior. I don't know how other companies allow their harnesses to be run. But in 20 years of experience, I never worked for a customer who just let the harness flop around like a big spline. Every place I've ever been including my current employer expects a harness to be dressed very clean, very neat, and (if at all possible) very straight. I can mimic this perfectly using this technique.

Note, I do not drop a bunch of datum points on my sketches. I simply use the vertices of the sketch itself. I frequently make small (2 point) network segments and link them together. I need to demonstrate this in a video. It's an easy system but it's much easier demonstrated in a video rather than trying to explain it in words.

WHY bother with sketches? Simple. If you keep the actual cabling commands to a bare minimum, anyone can do harness work. Most people are afraid of it. I base my techniques on basic Creo structures like datums and sketched curves... precisely because everyone understands them. Anyone can modify a sketch quickly and easily... and the harness updates immediately. If I've dropped 200 points using a coordinate system, or a set of datum points hovering in x,y, and z coordinates in space, those things have to be painstakingly moved by hand to alter the shape of my harness. Plus, the harness often assumes the "spline" behavior even if I set the cabling environment to "straight".With sketches, I can make some fairly radical changes far faster.

By combining this technique with autorouting, anyone can use Creo Cabling. I don't use sketches because I am unaware of the other ways to route a network or a wire... or because I am an novice. I use them because after digging through every possible nuance of the cabling package, it's still the fastest, most robust way I've found to create a harness. The trick is to keep users out of the cabling package until they absolutely have to use it. Then, when they DO need it, to keep the special cabling commands to a minimum. I've created a cabling cheat sheet (Wildfire 5 version) to help people practice the techniques I use. It's meant to be printed out double-sided (and maybe laminated). For people who don't often use cabling, they tend to forget the various commands and steps to creating a harness. This was meant to give them a reminder.

Sorry for the long reply. I wanted to write something much more comprehensive but I hope this can suffice for now. The cheat sheet is attached. Also... I've provided a link to the new Piping, Cabling & Schematics<">http://communities.ptc.com/community/creo/piping-cabling-schematics> section of Planet PTC Community. This area is specifically to share information, post questions, and discuss routed systems topics. My personal BLOG<">http://communities.ptc.com/blogs/the_zone> which deals primarily with all Creo routed systems modules is there as well. My presentation from Planet PTC 2012 is there but without the videos to accompany the presentation which demonstrate the actual routing techniques, it's not as useful as I'd like. I'm working on re-editing the videos. I'll post them as soon as possible.

Thanks and best regards,
-Brian

Brian K. Martin
Sr. Mechanical/Application Engineer
SGT, Inc. under contract to
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

301.286.0059 (NASA Office)
443.421.2532 (Cell)
-

1_ninja_cabling_quick_reference.zip

D

dbowles

Author

4-Participant

Creo now has the capability to break all global references.