stevsmith Posted December 15, 2011 Share Posted December 15, 2011 I have created a table frame using the Frame Generator in Inventor 2012. When I insert the assembly into a drawing and add a BOM table. It is not recognising some of the sections which have been either trimmed back or mitred on the corners. It is giving me incorrect cutting lengths. I have attached the assembly file in question. Notice there are 2 items which are mitred at 2000mm long. There are also 2 items that are 1920mm long. The BOM is identifying these items as the same in the table and that it is equal to 4 items at 2000mm which is incorrect. 151211-100.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bishop Posted December 15, 2011 Share Posted December 15, 2011 This is one of my biggest peeves with Inventor, to be perfectly honest. Annoys the crap out of me. What you have to do is go into each piece of steel, then on the TOOLS tab, click on DOCUMENT SETTINGS, go to the BILL OF MATERIALS tab, and change the BASE QUANTITY. The default is G_L, which returns the base quanitity as a length, and so your parts list will just total up the lengths of all the steel that is the same size. Change this to EACH on the pulldown menu, vice G_L, and it will show you 2 pieces at 1920 and 2 pieces at 2000 on your parts list. It's so freaking annoying, though, when you've got 30 or 40 pieces of steel in an assembly - you have to change every single one. I spent a few hours with Google one day trying to find a way to set the default on this to EACH, but it doesn't exist. I did find a lot of forum posts with people complaining about this all the way back to 2006 or so, though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevsmith Posted December 16, 2011 Author Share Posted December 16, 2011 Thanks for getting back to me bishop. I followed your instructions to the letter, but the BOM is still only recognising 4 items instead of 2 & 2 items. Image 2. ( i got them the wrong way around when loading them (bad day)) Shows the items in question. You can clearly see what is happening. Image 1 however, shows the BOM in Document settings. I have noticed that the user parameters show G_L(2000.00000mm) - "I'm assuming this it the initial length when creating the skeleton" G_Offset_Start (40.000mm) - The first trim. G_Offset_End (40.000mm) - The end trim B_L (2000.000mm) - This surely should be the final length = to 1920mm What an absolute pain in the backside this is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bishop Posted December 16, 2011 Share Posted December 16, 2011 Okay, I just made a quick assembly here to look at. Made it with Frame Generator. It's just 4 1" round bars, started off with 10" lengths. Used the LENGTHEN / SHORTEN tool on the Design Tab to take 1/4" off both ends of the middle two bars. This is the BOM tab for the second bar from the top in this picture, the one that's highlighted. B_L means (I think) BASE LENGTH. I don't know what the G in G_L stands for. My BOM shows up correctly on the .IDW file as well. What you're seeing there is strange. I don't know why it would be showing you B_L and G_L both the same, when it shows offsets there ... Try experimenting on this with a whole new assembly, see if you can get any different results? (That said, we still have 2011 at work. I've played with the trial version of 2012 at home, but I've not messed with 2012's frame generator ... yet. Maybe there's just some wierdness with 2012?) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevsmith Posted December 16, 2011 Author Share Posted December 16, 2011 See, I never had this problem previously with 2011, I'm wondering if this is a failure with 2012. Extremely frustrating stuff. The trouble is, i won't sleep till this is sorted. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bishop Posted December 16, 2011 Share Posted December 16, 2011 See, I never had this problem previously with 2011, I'm wondering if this is a failure with 2012. Extremely frustrating stuff. The trouble is, i won't sleep till this is sorted. I'll try it with 2012 at home tonight, see what happens. Also, which tool did you use to adjust the length? Lengthen / Shorten, Trim / Extend, or Trim to Frame? I haven't really used Trim to Frame, but I've always had decent results with the other two. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevsmith Posted December 16, 2011 Author Share Posted December 16, 2011 I think it was "Trim to Frame/Face" option???. You select the member then the face you wish to trim it to. I cant remember off hand, and wont be back in the office till Monday. I only have SW at home. I'll give the lengthen/shorten and trim extend a bash on my return. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shorty72032 Posted January 20, 2012 Share Posted January 20, 2012 There is a hotfix out there for this and Autodesk is reporting it is included in the SP 1.0 http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Autodesk-Inventor/Frame-Generator-G-L-Hotfix-2012/td-p/3203048 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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