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L
LawrenceS18-Opal
18-Opal
July 14, 2016
Question

Auto constraints for components when adding to assembly?

  • July 14, 2016
  • 2 replies
  • 2717 views

Does anyone know if there is a way to set default constraint types?  Almost all of our parts get aligned by center axis (consistently named in both asm and component), and then by another plane (also consistently named).  Ideally this could get done by a config option for default behavior (so that every component would not have to be modified), but if that is not possible and you know of another way I would really like to hear of any workarounds/alternatives.

Since we have been so consistent in our naming and the assembly constraints are so basic, it sure seems like we should be able to have this defaulted without user interaction.


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2 replies

R
rcook1-Visitor
1-Visitor
July 14, 2016

Have you looked at using component interfaces? Although it would require modifying components...

L
LawrenceS18-OpalAuthor
18-Opal
July 14, 2016

There are some components that have that set in our database, however it is only for that component.  For example, it will come in asking for an assembly axis and a datum plane/surface and the user has to choose the assembly equivalents.  I would like it to do this automatically since we are so consistent.  Also it seems not to allow additional constraints once those have been chosen and we definitely want users to use additional constraints according to the indiv component.

Any way to do this better?

R
rcook1-Visitor
1-Visitor
July 14, 2016

You can use the auto place functionality inside of the assembly and then pick from the list of matching assembly locations. Or pick a screen point near where you want it and the component interface and auto place will do the rest.

J
James621-Visitor
1-Visitor
July 14, 2016

What you want is some sort of script that can read from the model tree of the model file upfront, even before the model is loaded into the assembly, and then once it's there run just the correct mapkey that will pick the right component constraint references and the constraint types for each both based on the decision made by the script beforehand.

JLink can read data from models not yet opened. Models that are in session, in workdir or in any search path, but if you've got many types of models, it'd require you to code many cases. JLink is also not easy to set up, and most importantly (at least for me) it's pretty tough to learn Java.

R
rcook1-Visitor
1-Visitor
July 14, 2016

You could do this in Smart Assembly pretty easily. A lot easier to learn and work with than JLink, but it's an add-on to Creo that you have to buy.

L
LawrenceS18-OpalAuthor
18-Opal
July 15, 2016

James62‌ & Roger Cook,

Do we really need a complex script to do this?  The functionality that would be ideal is what Creo does when replacing a table using the reference table.  Within that feature it has an evaluate button which tries to match up common references based on a small set of rules.  This would be ideal if I could do something like this.  Actually if I had that button exact functionality and button within assembly mode it would help tremendously!

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