Toolish Posted October 9, 2008 Posted October 9, 2008 I work with some reasonably large assemblies and there are alway possible issues with things not being fully constrained and it not being noticed until it is too late. Is there a way to test an assembly (and all sub-assemblies) to confirm they are all fully constrained? Quote
shift1313 Posted October 9, 2008 Posted October 9, 2008 you can design sub assemblies in different files and make sure they are associative. For instance i do a lot of designing with air cylinders. I can build an air cylinder model assembly and import this assembly into a new file. Having said that i usually start my constraints from scratch a few times during a model because of issues:) In the modeling side you can drive constraints. Usually i just modify their offsets, for the air cylinder example. I will have the piston constrained to the bore of the cylinder body. By changing this offset(say from 0 to 4 inches) it moves the rest of my assembly(assuming its right). If you do this throughout a model you will be fine. Quote
Toolish Posted October 10, 2008 Author Posted October 10, 2008 you can design sub assemblies in different files and make sure they are associative. For instance i do a lot of designing with air cylinders. I can build an air cylinder model assembly and import this assembly into a new file. Having said that i usually start my constraints from scratch a few times during a model because of issues:) In the modeling side you can drive constraints. Usually i just modify their offsets, for the air cylinder example. I will have the piston constrained to the bore of the cylinder body. By changing this offset(say from 0 to 4 inches) it moves the rest of my assembly(assuming its right). If you do this throughout a model you will be fine. thanks for the post. I may not have explained myself properly. I understand driven constraints and how they work. What I want to do is have Inventor highlight to me any part or assembly that is not fully constrained and therefore may move in an unexpected/undesired way. I can manually do this but it is a long slow process and was hoping some automation could help out. My main project has evolved through 2 other designers (over 3 years) and without being rude their constraint methods, part numbering and general CAD philosophy were less than perfect, since taking over design control I have been trying to clean up the model but I know there are places where constraints have fallen off. Every now and then I notice another part that is not fully constrained and I just want a way to double check the the complete model is fixed. I hope that makes sense. Quote
shift1313 Posted October 10, 2008 Posted October 10, 2008 yes it does makes sense but as far as i know there isnt a check for this, because it is not required that an object be fully constrained. The newest version I am using is inventor from 2007 so im not sure if the new inventor has a more comprehensive design check other than interference/collision. Quote
Aardvark Posted October 17, 2008 Posted October 17, 2008 There should be a degrees of freedom option in view that would help. Though it can get pretty difficult to look at if you have lots of parts. Quote
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