Visualization of a Product Structure with Parts associated to a CAD document using Image Link

[mjohansson-2]

To suppport multiple cad document related to one Part you can use Image link as an association to a Part.

For example a sealing ring, you ca have one model that shows the sealing in a unmounted state. This model have a Owner Link to the Part.

Then you have one or more cad document that have the sealing ring modelled in a mounted state. (changed diameter).

These CAD document you associate with Image Link to the same Part.

Then you use the mounted models (with image loinks) in a Cad ssembly.

If go to the CAD structure tab an looka the visualization tab, this visualisation shows the correct cad representations.

But if you go the Part Structure tab this visulaization is incorrect.

Here you see the default representation of the Part, which is the represenation of cad model with owner link.

So, the enhancemnet that must be fixed, ic that it showed be posible to dynamically visulaise a part structure with parts that have image linked cad documents.

This visualization is vital in Manfuacturing Product Structure Browser (MPMLink)

[GregoryPERASSO]

Agree.... PTC implements Image links for "flexible - alternate reps" CAD models , but does not support it in BOM dynamic visualization ...

John Deer has made great keynotes during Liveworx 2017. And this limitation was the key point as they use intensively CreoView for Digital Mockup review in a BOM context with Options and Variants. And lead them to a custom "not state of the art" solution, by duplicating these alternate CAD models in "dummys" WTparts with a common numbering schema. And then "truncate" the dummy number when sending to ERP ...

But I was particulary disapointed when talking with Deer and PTC product managers (MCAD integration and Viz) , to know why they do not enhance the Viz service to publish and load "image viz" at occurence level for that case.

Deer has Project milestone that I can understand.

But apparently PTC does not plan to implement this cause no other potential customers !?

I really don't understand why ...  regarding PTC roadmap and  all the potential features that will need it !     Dynamic Viz of configurable products,  Augmented Reality, Digital twins, Manufacturing or Industry 4.0 (MES, Control Characteristics and 3D work instructions) , etc ...

[ngiacom]

I agree and I would like to post my related idea:

Creo View Adapters: Add Image relationships (WTParts) in the representations of EPMDocument (configu...

Thanks

[romorrison]

This functionality is currently being planned for implementation as part of the Windchill 11.2.0.0 release with follow-on work planned for future releases to handle legacy data.

In order to address this the build service will now populate an additional field on each occurrence link to indicate the CAD document master from which the occurrence link came from.  That will be used as part of the dynamic visualization process to correctly identify and visualize the correct representation of the part based on it's usage instead of it's default representation.

In addition to the correct visualization, part of the implementation of this project required the publishing process to correctly populate the part information onto the representation of the image associated CAD document.  This will be available along with the 11.2.0.0 release as well.

[JenniferPierron]

This functionality is implemented in 11.2.0.0 for PSB

[Florent]

Hi @JenniferPierron , @romorrison 

Could you clarify if an owner related CAD representation will still take precedence on an image related CAD representation ?

I am under the impression this enhancement is for multiple image links only.

Thanks,

Florent

[romorrison]

Hi @Florent ,

This works by identifying which CAD document was used to build the parent assembly structure and load the appropriate representation based on that.

The occurrence link will contain an additional attribute specifying the EPMDocumentMaster that was used to build the occurrence as long as it was not an owner-link.  This is then used to visualize the correct CAD document based what was actually used in the CAD assembly which built the structure.

In this way the enhancement does not choose image or owner link specifically but instead visualizes what ever was used to build the structure.

As Jennifer mentioned, this has been implemented for the Part Structure Browser and is currently being worked on for downstream structures and structure based visualization (xBOM, Process Plans, etc..).  Once this is completed I'll mark the idea as completed.

Hope that helps.

Robbie

[Florent]

@romorrison 

this clarifies the behavior, thank you !

Florent

[Zoltán]

Hi,

Status says: Implementation In Progress,  how's this coming along? Any timeline or specific release# planned?

Kind regards

Zoltán

[romorrison]

Hello @Zoltán 

The implementation here is still in progress and underway.  The latest update is that with Windchill 12.1.0.0, which was released in December 2021, we have now added support for Visualization of Image Link content in transformed bill of materials and process plans.  There is a limitation with process plans which will does not yet support the part associated with the operation visualizing image associated content, however the children of that part will correctly visualize image associated content.

You can enable this by setting the property below:

https://support.ptc.com/help/wnc/r12.1.0.0/en/#page/Windchill_Help_Center/NewandChanged/NewandChange...

This setting transfers the management of the visualization overrides (assembly features, positioning logic, and image linked content) to being stored in the database which can then be transformed as part of a BOM transformation process.  

Once the final gaps have been closed we will mark this idea as completed, however this marks a significant milestone in closing this gap out.

Robbie

[awijkmark]

Article https://www.ptc.com/en/support/article/CS329998 state Windchill only support this in the beginning of the product lifecycle.

It work in PSB, BOM Transformer and Tree Picker but NOT in Process Plan Browser and probably not in Advanced Manufacturing Resource Browser.

The article state there is no plan to implement this for the manufacturing part of Windchill and probably not to integrations with Manufacturing Execution Systems thru ERP-integration or REST call services.

It is amazing that PTC call Windchill a PLM solution when most of the functionality only supports BOM and does not follow to manufacturing part of the data management.

@romorrison When is this planned to be included to the full product life cycle data management ?