How to Mirror a part with text/feature you want to alter

[DamianCastillo]

I am going to give two examples of my issue in hopes that someone has a suggestion. The second case is a little confusing.

1. Mirror a part with text

We often create a mirror part but we do not want to mirror the text for obvious reasons. The text on our parts are part of the casting. If you mirror a part with text, the text appears incorrect/mirrored on the other part. If we suppress the text before we mirror, we can add the text to the mirrored part, but if we resume the text of the original, it will show up on the mirror version. (We want them to be dependent)

2. Mirror a part with different feature

If we have a part that has a mirrored version but one specific feature is different. We want to create the mirror part but exclude that one feature. In order to keep the parts dependent, we created an instance of the original part and turned off/suppressed that feature on the instance. We then open the instance and create a mirror part from it. Now we can add the new feature to the mirrored version.

This works but the problem is that when you try to Save a Copy of this part, it all falls apart.

We open the original (Generic) part and Save a Copy to a new name. You must open the table and rename the instance but the mirrored part will continue to reference the original instance name which still exist but it's not in session. I tried opening the mirrored and Save a Copy to it's new name in hopes that when I have it in session and rename the instance on the new part created from the generic, that it would update the link between them but it does not work. The mirrored part and the Save a Copy of the mirrored part still links itself to the original instance name.

Any ideas on how to mirror a part that is dependent while excluding a single feature between them. We can't figure out a way to make this work. If we make the mirror process independent, it works but we loose the ability to make changes to one part and have it automatically update the other.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

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[mpeterson]

Damian,

What I did recently was to create the mirrored part in a family table and thus created the mirror prior to making the text or feature(s) not desired in the first part. Get the part to the stage of having all the features you want mirrored and then you can make a surface copy of all solid geometry (presuming it is solid). Then mirror the new surface so it is separated from the original part geometry, so you can trim it away in the mirrored copy (instance). Next solidify the surface and add the text or other desired features in the mirrored part. Add a cut to trim away all the original geometry. This feature and the others from the surface copy will need to be in the instance. If desired you can then add features to the generic and make sure you specify them to be only in the generic in your family table.

It has been about 4 months since I did this, so that is the general approach I took. I think I might have also created the base common geometry as the generic and then createdthe original hand from the copy allsolid geometry and solidify as an instance too. I think either should work.

Hope this makes since and works for you. Maybe there is a more robust or elegant way, but I am open to other methods as well.

Sincerely,
Mark A. Peterson
Design Engineer
Varel International

[BrentDrysdale]

Hi Damian,
I suggest you look at using Inheritance features to achieve the degree of
control you are looking for. I saw a presentation at the 2010 conference
on Inheritance parts and thought they had good application for just the
type of thing you are describing.
I can find that presentation and the sample parts I made at that time (WF4)
together with a short Powerpoint explaining it if you want these.


Regards,

*Brent Drysdale*
*Senior Design Engineer*
Tait Communications

[merrill.rosenow]

Another solution would be to mirror the partkeeping the model tree. In the mirror part you could supress the original text and recreate it.

There may also be a way to change the driving dimensions of the text to force it to a negative number and thus create the text in the proper orientation. I've never tried this specifically, but it may help if you want to keep more of the common features/dimensions than recreating the text.

[dgschaefer]

You're close to what I've done in the past.


1. Create the parent part.
2. Add a family table to the parent and create an instance with the non-mirrored features excluded.
3. Create your mirrored part, referencing the instance
4. Add the text and other revised features to the mirrored part

To make a copy of these parts:


1. Back them all up into an empty, temporary directory.
2. Open the generic, then the instance and finally the mirrored part into an empty session.
3. Rename each, using file -> rename.
4. Save all files.
5. Back them up back into your main working directory.

We don't use any sort of PDM here, so I'm not sure how that would affect the process.

--

[DamianCastillo]

Doug,

That worked out perfectly.

Thank you very much for your input.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

[dgallup]

You can simply use the rename in session functionality to avoid the backing up twice.

Just do file rename, check in session so the versions on disk are not changed. Do this for all 3 parts, save all 3 parts.

In Reply to Doug Schaefer:

You're close to what I've done in the past.


1. Create the parent part.
2. Add a family table to the parent and create an instance with the non-mirrored features excluded.
3. Create your mirrored part, referencing the instance
4. Add the text and other revised features to the mirrored part

To make a copy of these parts:


1. Back them all up into an empty, temporary directory.
2. Open the generic, then the instance and finally the mirrored part into an empty session.
3. Rename each, using file -> rename.
4. Save all files.
5. Back them up back into your main working directory.

We don't use any sort of PDM here, so I'm not sure how that would affect the process.

--

[dgschaefer]

Yes, that's an option but I like the 'safety' of working in a remote folder. Seems harder to mess up.

--

[BrentDrysdale]

Hi Folks,
Have been pretty busy so only just back to this. I will try and attach a
PDF that showed very briefly an example of an Inheritance part use in case
that seems useful. Not sure if it is small enough to get through.
This followed for the presentation I saw at the 2007 conference by Craig
Iverson & Kevin Alexander of Fluidmaster on Inheritance V Family Tables
(particularly in relation to going into PDM).


Regards,

*Brent Drysdale*
*Senior Design Engineer*
Tait Communications

[ptc-196189]

Related to this topic:
Is it there any way to mirror an assembly, where only few parts required to have the geometry mirror?
For example fasteners or standard parts doesn't required to be mirror.
Also we need the drawing to be create for this mirror. We need to have a drawing even for mirrored models and assemblies. We had different issues where
Instead to manufacture the mirror model they manufacture the original one, or the geometry being complicated for some geometry that required to be manufacture
Entering manually the coordinates on the Cnc machine were entered wrong values
Thx
Cc