Community Tip - Learn all about the Community Ranking System, a fun gamification element of the PTC Community. X
Is there a way to dissociate pattern features? For example, I have a large directional pattern of .125 dia holes and need to modify certain holes to .250 dia. Can I somehow separate the pattern into individual hole features? (I am using WF4)
I want to do this instead of deleting the existing pattern and creating a table or brand new holes because the holes are already associated with other parts in an assembly and I don't want to redefine everything over again.
Thanks!
There is an "unpattern" command that will allow you to delete a pattern but keep all the pattern features. Unfortunately this only works with table patterns and dimension patterns, not direction patterns. (This is WF5, not sure about WF4.)
In order to minimize the downstream impact, I would suggest you "turn off" the specific pattern instance you need to change, create one new hole feature for that special case, and then update those downstream items that reference that specific hole. This will let you keep the pattern for everything that doesn't need to change while still allowing you to change the one hole that does.
By the way, to "turn off" a pattern feature, pick on the black dot over the specific pattern instance. It will change from black to white and no longer be part of the pattern.
Thanks for the help. Is the "unpattern" command only available if the original feature is already in a group? I can't seem to get the "unpattern" command to show up on an existing pattern.
feature>group>pattern>ungroup works.
feature>pattern>unpattern doesn't work.
Convert the existing pattern to a table pattern
Add the diameter dimension to the table
Edit the table and change diamter to 0.350 on desired patterm members (holes)
Or just create the new hole on the axis of the patterned hole. This works if the hole is larger/deeper although you could "fill in" a patterned hole to go the other way (revolve). it all depends on how clean you want the model to be. Personally I like point patterns (datum point sketch driven) so you can use the same sketch and apply two different patterns to it by excluding points in the pattern dialog.