Identifying duplicate/similar models in Windchill - Modelcheck

[jbissell]

Community members -

Do a lot of you use the check for duplicate models capability in ModelCheck? If so, does it work well for you? Anyone know of any good videos/information demonstrating this capability?

[STEVEG]

We have been investigating this.  I have looked at geometry search through ModelCheck.

Although it does search for duplicate models the feature is limited.  Part of the problem is the model has to have the density added to every model.

There were also issues between builds of Creo 2. In M110 I only get the Search for duplicate models check in ModelCheck. But in M170 I also get the Duplicate Models check in ModelCheck.

As I mentioned ModelCheck doesn't give you alot and therefore we started looking at other software.  We are getting close to making a decision.  Yes, it does cost more but for us it is worth it.

[jbissell]

The interface looks to be bare bones, but in your experience, how good is it at identifying something that you would consider duplicate/similar geometry?

We add the density (included in the material file) to our CAD files as SOP, so that isn't a problem.

We are on Creo 2, M210 as well.

What other software solution are you also looking at?

[STEVEG]

It is very bare bones.  That is part of the reason why we decided against it.

I spent a lot of time with PTC tech support because it wasn't working the way the help said it should.

We have been adding the density to our models for about 8 years but we still have alot of models that didn't have it.  That would have been a huge separate project we would have to do.  Not having the density on many models is another reason we decided to go in a different direction and therefore I really didn't get a sense of how good or how bad it was at identifying duplicate models.

We looked at 5 different companies and have it narrowed down to 3 right now.

ModelSearch from Techsoft

Shape Based Search from Sconce Solutions

PartsSolutions from Cadenas

[TomU]

@STEVEG, I'm curious, did you evaluate CADseek?

Are you willing to share the pros/cons of each of the packages you evalutated?

[STEVEG]

Yes, we did evaluate CADseek but they were one of the two we eliminated.  The other one is 3DSearchIT.  We used the concept selection process.  I think that's what it's called.  It's where you assign each criteria a weight value and score how well you think the criteria is.  They both scored alot lower.

My boss at the time and another person here actually started out doing the evaluation of these companines.  However, I came in half way through because my boss retired at the end of last year and I took over her job.

I just talked to the othe person that started with this project and he said he actually posted some info already on here somewhere.  You might look for his information.  Lawrence Scheeler.

[STEVEG]

Here are a few of the posts we created in the past regarding this topic.

Review of 3D Model/Geometry/Shape Searching Software?

Duplicate model search using built in pro/e config

Shape Indexing Not Working