Autodesk Inventor

[#1]

Hi,

I have a complex autocad produced 3d dwg file that contain about 20 layers has a lot of small parts and is around 20mb. I can view the file and all is fine in dwg trueview, however when i try to import it to inventor the process takes up over 2gb of ram and never completes I have left it for several hours without completion. To be clear about what i have done, i import the dwg, the option of excluding layers does not appear, but on the final import page i select 3d solids and new part-wires to 3d or 3d sketch (any other option results in inventor crashing...). I am really stuck with this, as redrawing in inventor will be very time consuming. Any suggestions?

Thanks

[#2 · Accepted solution]

Have you tried to export the 3D solids out of AutoCAD as a STEP file then import the STEP into Inventor?

[#3]

Would exporting it out of ACAD in a dxf format then importing the dxf file into INventor be an option?

[#4]

Thanks for the replies, I managed to export it in .sat format and that works fine when I import it into Inventor. After doing that I want to work out the internal void space in the container and produce this as a part, I have applied boundary patches to the openings and then tried to sculpt them to give the shape. However, the boundaries seem to have become disconnected and the sculpt fails. For instance a closed circle in autocad once exported to inventor gives a curve composed of three arcs, I select all the arcs to create a patch and it shows the correct preview but then fails to create the boundary. Is there a way of grouping the items so that contacting bodies become a single body in Inventor? Or any other suggestions as to how to calculate the void space?

[#5]

Another method you might want to try if you haven't already  (and I have done this many times)

is to have the ACAD drawing open then window the sketch and do a ctrl -C and ctrl-P into an Inventor sketch.

[#6]

I would not use AutoCAD 2D to create the patches in Inventor - not needed.

[#7]

Product Design Suite 2012 win 7 64 bit

Cannot import 3d objects from autocad mechanical. Always fails to load drawing 

in previous versions of inventor it would give me dialog boxes to select which object to import and setting, here it fails before these dialog. I can however open just not import and that doesn't help when wanting to create a flat pattern in sheet metal environment.

[#8]

Additional info: on a win7 pro 32bit after installing trueview 2013 so to select which objects to import (trueview 2012 was not previously installed and doesn't seem to be available anymore, though prior versions are) I was able to import 3d objects and change environment to sheet metal to make a flat pattern. But this doe not help me with the win 7 pro 64bit product design suite premium.

[#9]

Problem has finally been decoded.... Its the **** Windows 7 UAC ..... The fix is to shut the UAC off and even though this opens it up for any program to infect my system Mikcrosoft must think its an all programs can do this or non can. No exceptions for selected programs.

Now that I have identified the culprit how about a solution from Autodesk to allow me to not have the UAC off but still be able to import dwgs into inventor?