Autodesk Inventor

[#1]

Hi All,

I was wondering if anyone can help my create a circular pattern in an assembly that maintains the orientation of the part being patterned.

This is for foundation plates. There are 3 plates. The plates are square, and have bolt holes in the corners of the plates. Since there are 3 plates and its going around a circle, the angle between the plates is 120 degrees.

Now, Ive been trying this for some time now and what is happening is the firs plate is fine, but then the second and third plate are rotated around their center axis. I would like it to simply remain as inserted and constrained within the assembly.

I have attached a picture to be more clear about what I want and what I'm currently getting.

Maybe someone knows more about this and can possibly help me out with this.

I would really appreciate this.

Cheers,

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Vijai Christopher Sookrah

Mechanical Engineer, EIT

Aircraft Appliances & Equipment Ltd.

[#2]

Me personally would not pattern 3 parts..

But to answer you issue there is no way to control the part from rotating with circular pattern.

[#3]

The reason why I try to pattern 3 parts is because we are trying to streamline this with an iassembly.

Ive already got the 4 plates case in properly.

to be completely honest I was hoping this would work just so there was no need to manually add parts.

I cant believe there is no option for this.

Thanks though

[#4]

Oh I agree there should be an option to do this but this is Inventor they do as they wish not as we need...

[#5]

I dont really understand why Inventor has such little functionality in this area and many more.

I found a work around which I thought would save the day but then I woke up and smelt the coffee.

My idea was to make the components that were out of orientation independant and then re mate them accordingly with the geometry. This would have worked well because it would blend in well with my iassembly features, but for some reason these parts dont have any references when made independant. Not only do they have no axis, no planes or points; in assembly files you dont have the ability to create planes, points, or axis as freely as you do in part files.

For Shame, Autodesk. For Shame.

[#6]

LOL thats funny that would have been my thought but I knew that making them independant would just be a part.

[#7]

Use rectangular pattern instead.  Sketch a 240° arc and use that for Direction 1; expand the dialog box (>>) and you have choices for orientation (I'm not on an Inventor computer now, so I can't give you the details or a screen shot).

[#8]

I may be wrong, but I do not know if this will work in an Assembly file or will this only work in a Part file.

Cheers,

---

Vijai Christopher Sookrah

Mechanical Engineer

Aircraft Appliances & Equipment Ltd.

[#9]

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vsookrah wrote:

I may be wrong, but I do not know if this will work in an Assembly file or will this only work in a Part file.

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Create pattern of workpoints (or other geometry) in part with this technique and then in assembly constrain using the part pattern feature.