Material piping parts

[Matthijs1]

Using the piping module you can use the Pipe Solid to create pipe parts.

These pipe parts have no material. You can add material in the line stock but like many options in creo, this doesn't do anything (doesn't even change the weight/length in the same menu lol)

My question is simple: How can I add material to the piping parts (without doing it manually for every single piece of pipe ofcourse)

I can think of two options:

Option 1: Through the line stock material option.

but since that option doesn't do anything...

Option 2: Through relations. In the linestock I can fill in stock number which shows up as a parameter in the part. I want to add a relation to the template of the pipe part (still have to find out which template it uses and how to modify it) which basically says: IF stocknumber == A, then material =A. IF stocknumber == B, then material =B etc.

Can anyone help me out?

[tbraxton]

The line stock functionality supports specifying a Creo material file, this is different from setting the general parameter for material (a string). Have you set the material file up in the line stock definition?

Link to help file: Line Stock Parameter Files

[Matthijs1]

Yeah that's exactly the problem. Setting the material file does nothing. It only shows up in the menu as being selected but it doesn't influence the mass of the pipes and it does not set the material of the pipes.

[tbraxton]

Are you using spec driven piping or another paradigm? There are config options that influence how things work that may need to be set up. I am not an expert on this, so maybe someone else can offer some insight. 

Configuring Piping

[Matthijs1]

Just regular piping, not spec driven.

[BenLoosli]

I created 'special' start part files that can be applied to each pipe when they get solidified. Still a manual process, but it is a single button push to tell Creo to use a start part template instead of going through a bunch of menus to get the material assigned. Saves a bunch of time for our designers when they do large piping layouts.

[Matthijs1]

Like a template? I haven't found which template the piping module uses yet

[BenLoosli]

I am not a piping person, but the engineer was doing something in the solidify process and there was a button for specifying a start part to use. By creating material specific start parts, it saved him a lot of time and button pushes.

[Matthijs1]

Ah right yeah I found it! I tried it before but it didn't work but I just figured out you have to click the checkmark afterwards for some reason. Thanks a bunch! That's one step closer to giving this thing a material.

[Matthijs1]

So i've found a workaround to communicate material to our ERP system. 

The last thing I need is the appearance to be correct. Our pipes can have different colors and every color has a different material number.

I do have the material number as a parameter in the piping part. Now I need the appearance to change depending on what the number is. Is there a way?

[BenLoosli]

Color can be assigned to a material file.

Article - CS31202 - How to automatically assign a color or appearance to a part based on its material in Creo Parametric

[Matthijs1]

And material files can't be added through the piping module 🙄