Our weekly Did You Know series focuses on providing users with informative, “how-to” tips to help them get the most out of PTC Creo. This week’s post, provided by Director of Product Management Paul Sagar, shows users how to create family tables in PTC Creo Parametric. Users will learn how family tables enable you to create a large number of common parts quickly, based upon a generic design model.
Family tables are a collection of parts or assemblies which are similar, but deviate slightly in some aspect – such as size or included features. Bolts are a common example because they look similar and perform the same function regardless of their properties. It’s helpful to think of them as a family of part models. Parts in family tables are also known as table driven parts. In PTC Creo Parametric, you can create family tables in three easy steps.
Step 1: Identify Features Which Will Vary
First, you must identify which dimensions or features will vary for your family of parts. Click on the Model Intent overflow menu and select Switch Symbols. This will show you the symbolic name of the features dimensions in your generic part (such as size or depth). From here, you will know which dimension will be altered in your family of parts.
Click on the Switch Symbols command under the Model Intent drop down to understand the names of the dimensions in your part. This will help you identify what you need to change.
Step 2: Create the Family Table
Go back into the Model Intent overflow and select Family Table. Click Add Columns in the family table dialog box. With Dimension selected in the Add Item section, click on a feature in the model, and then select the dimension you wish to add to the family table.
From the Family table command, we can choose which parameters we want to alter in each of the instances we create.
We can also add parameters into our family table (such as descriptions). In the Add Items section, click Parameter, then choose what you want to add (description for instance), and click Insert Selected. You can see the parameter has been added to the table. Parameters added to the table can be edited in each of the part instances. You can also add features from the model tree, which can be included or excluded in the part instances.
Step 3: Edit Instances
After choosing the parameters, we can chose the number of instances we want in our family table. Simply click Add Instances until you have the desired quantity. You can edit the parameters for each specific instance. To finish the table, click Verify instances. This will tell you if your changes can be regenerated. Finally, you can preview or open each instance by selecting the appropriate row and picking Open. In the family table menu you can edit and verify the specifications on each instance you will create. You can also preview each part.
In the family table menu you can edit and verify the specifications on each instance you will create. You can also preview each part.
In conclusion, family tables give you an easy systematic approach to creating a large number of related models.
Check out our video tutorial on the PTC University Learning Exchange (“Creating a Family Table”) to see this advice in action. We’d also love to hear your suggestions for working with family tables in PTC Creo Parametric.
For more in-depth product feature explanations, visit our Tech Tips area.
Have some ideas about what PTC Creo product features you’d like to learn more about? Send me a message or leave a comment below and we’ll write up the best ideas from the community. Thanks for reading, looking forward to all of your feedback!
In case you missed it, here are our recent Did You Know posts:
1) Tips and Tricks for Cable Design in PTC Creo Parametric Piping and Cabling Extension
2) Creating Helical Sweeps for Springs
3) How to Use Motion Skeletons to Quickly Design Mechanisms
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