PTC/ USER Community Networking

The Transformation: Levi’s PLM team shared key lessons the team learned during the launch process, as well as how they are continuing to support the tool.

In this session, attendees heard what to expect when upgrading to Windchill 11, including case study-centric results to help with project planning and expectations.

Do you know what a User Defined Feature is?  If no, and want to know more, please read on. To help you decide if you want to learn more about this session here are a few questions to ask yourself. - Do you have repetitive sets of features that need to be place on multiple models? - Have you ever wondered how to create a standard set of features for users to place? - Do your designs have similar features with some variances? - Do you have a set of features that are complicated to create but need to be easy to place? If you answer yes to any of these questions then read on! The presenter of this session helped attendees understand a Creo Parametric feature known as User Defined Features (UDF). The presenter discussed the basic functions of the UDF and offered some tips to making more complicated sets of features which could help you with design automation and simplifying repetitive type design features.

Attendees learned about the exciting new enhancements in Creo 4.0 in the area of mold and tooling design.

This session focused on how highly reliable and quality products should be delivered to market to beat the competition.

Are you thinking about replacing multiple Windchill PLM Systems with one enterprise system? Are you envisioning to have a single source for all of your engineering data shared across multiple locations, locally or globally? If your answer to either of these questions is affirmative then learn more. The presenter shared the story of Ingersoll Rand's vision of consolidating 49 factories, 5 PLM systems, and more than 30 change processes all into One Windchill PLM system. The presenter discussed the strengths, challenges and opportunities identified during the 4 year journey that may lay the groundwork for your organization to achieve similar success. The ability to leverage existing global engineering designs, to save engineering time by looking at existing parts and to have a common repository to be able to do that not only speeds up innovation but also helps in achieving operational excellence. The presenter also talked about the cross functional alignment, evolution of the deployment m

There is an evolution in business culture in the way that it looks at design, manufacturing, and product configuration management. The presenter addressed the emphasis required to achieve cultural change to lead a business from drawing based definition to model based definition.

Managing design data has historically been fraught with complexity and blunders. The sheer amount of supporting information along with the ability to ensure it is all controlled and connected with the data management systems, fabricators and manufacturing can make the tasks overwhelming! Many strides have been made in Model Based Definition allowing for virtual documentation for mechanical designs, but that has not been true for ECAD. Until now! Today Creo View coupled with IPC-2581 makes it possible to provide this type of documentation for PCB assemblies. This session discussed how to incorporate this emerging standard to help save time, reduce resources and ensure data quality across the design process.

Building on the new features of Creo View 3.1 released with Windchill 11, this session explored the latest updates, upcoming advancements, and the future vision for Creo View.

Attendees at this session learned about the exciting new enhancements in Creo 4.0 in the area of NC Machining and features being considered for version 5.0.

Attendees learned about the exciting new enhancements in Creo 4.0 in the area of assembly design.

This session focused on how companies leverage best practices in Windchill to build and validate product variants. Supporting technologies were also explored, including how to use interference analysis in Creo View to validate the variants, and how to leverage integrated change management capabilities (PR/CN, etc.) directly from the interference reports.

This session was a case study of how SRAM implemented part-centric and use it to  accelerate the development of customer-specific products. The session included a live demo of PDM functionality and demonstrated how to create a customer-specific product in under five minutes and how you can apply these techniques at your company.

This session took a close look at some of the information you may be collecting using a Model Based Design (MBD) approach and how it could be used to make further improvements to your product and/or process. For example, digital metrology data is used to inspect and verify parts, but beyond that it isn’t really looked at. In the new semantic digital format (QIF XML) the data contains traceable identifications that allow real time feedback from metrology systems to enable design optimization that is especially important in the prototype phase. As product development proceeds, metrology data enables processes to be tuned while maintaining baseline product quality. When in full production, digital metrology data enables intelligent storage and rapid retrieval of as-built product information for multiple purposes. Models that are manufactured using Computer-Aided Manufacturing (CAM) equipment provides lots of information about the manufacturing process that could be further analyzed to hel

Do you want to maximize the utilization of digital data across departments and on the shop floor? This session discussed how to make a paperless environment easier to navigate through the use of Creo View and Windchill. Design annotation and collaboration are possible with help from combination states. By using both Windchill and Creo View viewables, a more intimate knowledge of the product is furnished and allows for improved dialogue between Manufacturing, Integration and Design. Joining forces between Creo, Windchill, and Creo View affords a significant savings in time by leveraging state-of-the-art tools to more accurately convey design intent and change. Specific topics discussed included combination state authoring, mark-up capability, viewing Windchill meta-data in Creo View, and a series of tips to allow for a seamless Creo View user experience.

This session was a no-nonsense approach to achieving complete configuration management without spending millions customizing  Windchill. The presenter offered sound advice to companies wanting to implement configuration management that are considering using Windchill for this purpose. Case studies and related experiences, coupled with in-depth familiarity with using Windchill were demonstrated why Windchill out of the box is more than capable of real and complete configuration management. The presenter shared a number of experiences to illustrate the idea of  customizing Windchill is not only expensive, but usually results in hobbled software that cannot be used to achieve configuration management. If your company has already installed and customized Windchill, and experienced unsatisfactory results have ensued, it may be the best thing to wipe all the disc drives clean, start again, and learn how to really use Windchill out of the box.

Windchill 11 presents a fresh look at PLM -- one that is focused on creating and leveraging smart, connected products. So what is next for PLM? Building on advancements in the current version of Windchill, this session discussed the roadmap and strategy for the PLM business at PTC, including new features in upcoming maintenance releases and beyond -- including a future vision for PLM at PTC and in the marketplace.

You’re developing hundreds to thousands of new products every year and spending millions of dollars in the process. How do you know what those new products should be? How should they be priced? How much should you produce or buy? First Insight along with Dick’s Sporting Goods’ Ryan Miller, Director of Business Systems and Sourcing, discussed how Dick’s is using First Insight to listen to the Voice of the Customer in their product decision-making process and increasing speed to market of the right branded and private label items. The session provided a preview of the future of smart, connected retail powered by First Insight, Windchill FlexPLM, and ThingWorx IoT.

Attendees heard about the exciting new direct modeling enhancements in Creo 4.0, including flexible modeling in standard and sheet metal mode as well as in Creo Direct 4.0.

Attendee heard about the exciting new enhancements in Creo 4.0 in the area of 3D printing.

Attendees heard about the exciting new enhancements in Creo 4.0 in the area of MDB & 2D detailing.

Drawings have been the mainstay of engineering communication and production control since the 18th Century, and many engineering processes still revolve around the principles established through drawing control. Today's leading manufacturing companies are transforming their process from drawing-centric to part-centric, shifting information from drawings into Windchill in order to alleviate bottlenecks and the chore of multiple data entry inherent in a drawing-centric process. In this session, the presenter shared best practices for managing essential information such as Bills of Material in a part-centric approach.

A well-tuned system is critical for companies to derive value from using Windchill. This session shared information on how best to deploy and tune a Windchill system. The presenter provided tips and techniques on how to monitor, troubleshoot and fix performance problems when they arise.

Updates in ISO 9001:2015 emphasize traceability, collaboration, and risk management throughout the product development process. In this session, attendees learned about harmonized product development and quality processes in Windchill that enable companies in highly regulated industries like medical devices to address ISO 9001:2015 updates with one PLM solution. With capabilities to manage changes throughout the product lifecycle, to trace the impact of those changes in quality feedback systems, and to address quality issues with not just corrective measures but preventive ones supported throughout the design and development process. Windchill meets the recommendations of the new standard to close the loop on product quality and product development.

Finding the perfect method for managing and synchronizing your ECAD, MCAD and Windchill library data synchronization can take a village! While collaboration benefits sound great, the devil, as they say, is in the details. For both ECAD-MCAD collaboration and ECAD-Windchill integration, component libraries must be separately created and maintained. However to work effectively, the associated libraries and meta data must be merged. This panel discussion which included a customer and ECAD vendor discuss how to approach each of the above, what was learned during implementation and their future plans.