Fair warning about using the Part as a starting point, there may be more steps but it's a more repeatable process. The one downside of using the part is that you may have to type in the name of the DXF. Which ever method you decide, remember to break this into small pieces by recording each little bit one at a time (say into a mapkey called TEMP), then saving the TEMP mapkey to your desktop, open TEMP.pro in Notepad, and pasting each small section of mapkeys together into your config.pro and save, and then load your updated DXF mapkey into Creo using the UPMAP mapkey from my other post about mapkeys. This is will allow you quickly build/test portions of your mapkey by solving one part at a time.
Here's the steps I used but feel free to start simple:
- Unbend model (if you're working with sheetmetal) - if this command fails because model is already unbent or is not a sheetmetal part, mapkey will skip this if you add the appropriate exit unbend button clicks
- Windchill Check Out Dialogue Box may popup - click continue
- Search model tree using Find Tool for All Cosmetic Features and Sketches and Hide them - this prevents sketches from showing up later in DXF.
- CTRL-A to select all from search results, add all to Selected Item column on the right, and then exit find tool - they should still be selected and then use the hide command
- You'll have to do this once for Cosmetic Features and then again for Sketches
- Create a new view for DXF using the View Manager - delete 'view4dxf' view so you can rerun the mapkey on the same part without getting errors about 'view4dxf' already existing. Then create 'view4dxf' view:
- To use 1 click for creating a view, Using 'View Normal' and 'Refit' Commands. If the orientation of your DXF matters, you can rotate the CAD model before clicking the surface to 'View Normal' to.
- Use the "@MANUAL_PAUSE" to prompt the user to pick the surface
- Create new drawing without a format
- Type in name of DXF - may need to include _DXF in the name if drawing already exists. You could have the mapkey make a temporary drawing file like 'tempdxf' and have the user name the DXF later at the end if desired
- Pause mapkey and have the user place the 'view4dxf' view on the drawing
- Set view settings - scale of 1.0, Display Style set to 'No Hidden' or whatever your DXF needs
- Delete extras annotations or things that might show up when placing views
- Use the Creo Find tool to find Notes, Symbols, and Surface Finishes... Select All (CTRL-A), and delete all (one type at a time)
- Might not be necessary but I delete all drawing layers which can remove some things that show up
- Consider adding a pause mapkey for a user to review/clean the DXF before export
- Export DXF
- There are several ways to export a DXF but using the Export>DXF sets the DXF settings BEFORE having the user chose a location/name. Set settings as needed and then click Export.
- If you have a standard location you like to save the DXFs to, navigate to it in the mapkey to save time. Remember that not everyone has your same 'Favorites' folders so consider pasting location into the bar at the top if your saving to a Network Drive. Clicking on the Desktop on shortcut will work to take you to the users Desktop if desired.
- Mapkey pause for user to save/name the DXF and prompt them to click Resume so you can close several windows that are now open.
- Click OK on the Save a Copy window - assuming you want to overwrite any DXF with the same name that exists in your target folder, you can click through these dialogues boxes to overwrite.
- Click Close Export DXF page
- Close the active Window - which should be the DXF drawing
- Erase Not Displayed to erase temporary DXF drawing
- The Part that you started from should now be open - you could close this automatically but I usually end the mapkey here with the part open.
