Multi-body Save As Assembly option.

[rnoah]

with the new multi-body functionality, introduced in Creo 7, you have the option to select a body and RMB "create part from body".

this is significant enhancement.

In order to complete the designer need two option are missing:

1. having the possibility to select multiple bodies from tree/screen RMB "Create ASM from bodies". the outcome of this should be an assembly with each body defined as a part and located at the relevant location ( according to geometry placement in part )

2. each part should have the geometry as a features rather than external geometry feature.

Having those options will improve design process.

[S_Edgenear]

I agree with the having the "Create ASM from bodies", after selecting several bodies, and having them placed in the same location in the assembly, but I think the option of the geometry in the generated parts having "inherited" the contributed feature set of the body similar to the part inheritance is not feasible.

The body can be constructed with features referencing other bodies or datums belonging only to the initial part. If somehow those features could be "exported" to the new part, there would be lots of problems with circular references, ie, references made in the context of the saved assembly. It would also increase regeneration times. It's better to have the geometry as a solid or dumb object. The only useful benefit I see in having the "features" exported to the new part, would be the possibility to "reference pattern" geometry that was patterned in the initial design of the body, such as holes or other datum features.

Could you give examples in which situations the "exported features" could improve the design process?

[rnoah]

Many thanks for your comment.

At the methodological level - Through the year i have seen many designers, in other software, using multi-body design as the first stage of the design. at this stage the symply use the ability to reference geometry, easily, without the need to create an asm. So, one you completed the "initial" concept/design you would like to have the ability to continue and develop the part as a "stand alone" part.

having the starting point as external geometry is limiting the usage of this approach as you will need to continue working on the multi-body part which can become challenging.

At the technical level - once you create the part from body you can't produce necessary drawing easily - as you can't use "show dimension" and you need to go and define one by one.

I do agree this is not an easy task. however, it can be done while using some approaches, such "backup references", used inside the asm environment.

in case that there are some gaps - it's o.k to have only some of the geometry as feature while other remain "dumb".

I personally believe in the approach that  - it is better to have 80% of the functionality 100% of the time rather than having 0% of the functionality 100% of the time due to some lack of ability to have "bulletproof" functionality.

[JM_5003565]

i came here to post this same request but I also don't think inheriting the features is the right move.  the master modeling approach you are proposing works off the assumption that the features live in the master model.  you can always add more features in the part file that are more detailed than what you want in the master.

I want the "save bodies as assembly" to basically work like a macro of what is already there.  It should automate the process of creating parts from each body.  it should use the body name as the new part name.  it should ask for an assembly name.  it should assemble each of the new parts to the new assembly using default constraint.

would it be possible as a user, to create a macro that does this if PTC doesn't want to do it?

[barryschaeffer1]

I agree with S_Edgenear that it's best to auto create an assembly without features.  I Would, however, like the ability to show annotations in the components of the assembly.  Not sure how this could work if you do NOT export features to the auto-created parts.

[S_Edgenear]

I think it would be very useful that the process to export a multibody part as an assembly (or several sub-asseblies) could and should be automated and parametric. With this, I mean, at the end of the geature tree of a multibody part, similar to the "Publish Geometry" at the footer, one could add one or several features, and this would be export features. These export features would indicate the name of the assembly, and allow the user to select the bodi3es that would go to that particular assembly. Whis would guarantee that if the designer added more bodies (meaning, future components), the assembly would be alays up-to-date. Also, since it would be a parametric association, if the user changed one body from one assembly to other sub-assembly, in the export feature, in the generated assembly the component would automatically be deleted in one sub-assembly and added to the other sub-assembly.

One export feature would create one assembly, and we could create more than one export feature to create several sub-assemblies. Having several assemblies be derived from a multi-body concept master model would allow quick creation of motion assemblies, where each body(component would be located at the correct sub-assembly (rigid group).

[barryschaeffer1]

I haven't thought through all of the consequences of your ideas, but they look intriguing...Barry