Community
Inventor Forum
Welcome to Autodesk’s Inventor Forums. Share your knowledge, ask questions, and explore popular Inventor topics.
cancel
Showing results for 
Show  only  | Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Modeling in Inventor, detailing in Mechanical

24 REPLIES 24
Reply
Message 1 of 25
Anonymous
892 Views, 24 Replies

Modeling in Inventor, detailing in Mechanical

Just curious. Anyone out there using both Inventor and Mechanical 6 to
create your drawings. What I am saying is, using Inventor to create the
models and generate the views and bom. Then exporting that out to Mechanical
6 to be detailed. Yes, I know the views will not update once it is exported.
I feel that Inventor's ability to detail in the idw is still not as strong
or flexable as it is in a 2D package. Especially when dealing with a lot of
circular and cylindrical parts.

So if anyone out there is using both, I would like some of your feedbacks.
Good and bad. Or if you feel that this is not the way to go, please argue
your point. I am open to suggestions. TIA
24 REPLIES 24
Message 2 of 25
MechMan_
in reply to: Anonymous

Not related to Purge's question but to this NG setup...

Purge posted this in both the R5.3 and R6 NG. I posted a reply to the one in the R5.3 NG (I saw it there first). Now anyone in this NG won't see my post without checking out Purge's post in the R5.3 NG. I understand why Purge did this but not all of us users can share our comments unless we travel back and forth between NG's.

Again, I'm not pleased with this multiple NG setup.

Oh yea, you'll have to go to the R5.3 NG if you care to see my response to Purge's question. Where will you post your response? Who knows?

MechMan
Message 3 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

Mechman

I think currently where so many of us are in a sort of limbo waiting on SP1 we will see
these problems a bit, but as time goes on and we settle into the current version I think
we will see less cross posting The MDT 6, MDT5, and MDT4 NG's have never had that big
of a problem with cross posting that I remember.

--
Kent
Member of the Autodesk Discussion Forum Moderator Program


"MechMan" wrote in message news:f11e826.0@WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
> Not related to Purge's question but to this NG setup...
Message 4 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

Here's a story...... (trying to be funny - but want to make a point - so don't
hit me.... )

Once upon a time, there were drafters who created beautiful drawings on paper.
About 20 years ago, they started taking notice of this new thing called CAD.
Problem was, that since it was a computer, they could not do everything that
they could do on a board. They were unhappy.....

However, they did notice one thing. They were FAR more productive on CAD than
the board, so they accepted the limitations and moved forward.....

About 15 years ago, those programmers at the CAD companies determined that users
would be much more productive if they worked in 3D, so they started developing
programs to create wonderful wireframe and surface modelers to improve
productivity. Unfortunately, the drawing output left much to be desired. Many
users of those 3D programs decided to export their 2D geometry to the DWG format
so they could continue to give the drawings that "AutoCAD look". Most of those
users continue to do that to this very day.

The big problem is that losing associativity will reduce your productivity
significantly. Fortunately MDT is good at detailing (wasn't always so, but it
improved.) and Inventor is catching up quickly.

I understand that companies have "standards", whatever that means to them.
However we need to understand that we are living in a world of very rapid
change, and engineering and other departments within companies need to
compensate for this...

My recommendation? I would not break the associativity, but instead investigate
moving as close to your standard in Inventor, and allow for changes in areas of
non-conformity. Inventor has improved IDW's with every release, just like
AutoCAD and MDT has....

Happy Halloween Everyone!

Dennis

Purge wrote:

> Just curious. Anyone out there using both Inventor and Mechanical 6 to
> create your drawings. What I am saying is, using Inventor to create the
> models and generate the views and bom. Then exporting that out to Mechanical
> 6 to be detailed. Yes, I know the views will not update once it is exported.
> I feel that Inventor's ability to detail in the idw is still not as strong
> or flexable as it is in a 2D package. Especially when dealing with a lot of
> circular and cylindrical parts.
>
> So if anyone out there is using both, I would like some of your feedbacks.
> Good and bad. Or if you feel that this is not the way to go, please argue
> your point. I am open to suggestions. TIA

--
Dennis Jeffrey
CAD Associates - Fort Wayne
Autodesk ASC
(260-432-9695 x 221
Message 5 of 25
MechMan_
in reply to: Anonymous

This one is not cross-posting between MDT and IV NG's (that type of separation makes sense). Purge's post is cross-posted between the IV R5.3 and IV R6 NG's.

As far as your comment on the future R6 SP1 release, not everyone is going to it. There are still plenty of R5 and R4 users out there who choose to say there (bad choice albeit) so I don't see this problem going away with the release of R6 SP1.

MechMan
Message 6 of 25
MechMan_
in reply to: Anonymous

Ooooo, that was a scary Halloween story at the beginning (paper drawings, 2D CAD). Glad it had a happier ending.

Paper drawings...that's just a myth isn't it? ISN'T IT!

;-)

MechMan
Message 7 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

I think you missed what I was saying. I know this was cross posted in the R5.3 and R6
NG's, and not posted in MDT

What I was getting at is the MDT newsgroups have been split up into releases for a long
time and cross posting was never a big problem in them that I remember. I suspect this
will be the same given some time.

--
Kent
Member of the Autodesk Discussion Forum Moderator Program


"MechMan" wrote in message news:f11e826.3@WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
> This one is not cross-posting between MDT and IV NG's (that type of separation makes
sense). Purge's post is cross-posted between the IV R5.3 and IV R6 NG's.
> As far as your comment on the future R6 SP1 release, not everyone is going to it. There
are still plenty of R5 and R4 users out there who choose to say there (bad choice albeit)
so I don't see this problem going away with the release of R6 SP1.
>
> MechMan
>
Message 8 of 25
MechMan_
in reply to: Anonymous

Ah, ok. Used MDT for years but never visited the NG's back then, or now for that matter.

Still don't like it. (had to get that last shot back in)

MechMan
Message 9 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

I prefer Inventor's drawing interface to MDT's. Plain and simple, it does
for me what I need it to do. Sure, I have a list of improvements as long as
my arm, but still I prefer using Inventor to Acad/MDT.

"Purge" wrote in message
news:3387DC19EC6A66791B40AB7A7A25C1F2@in.WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
> Just curious. Anyone out there using both Inventor and Mechanical 6 to
> create your drawings. What I am saying is, using Inventor to create the
> models and generate the views and bom. Then exporting that out to
Mechanical
> 6 to be detailed. Yes, I know the views will not update once it is
exported.
> I feel that Inventor's ability to detail in the idw is still not as strong
> or flexable as it is in a 2D package. Especially when dealing with a lot
of
> circular and cylindrical parts.
>
> So if anyone out there is using both, I would like some of your feedbacks.
> Good and bad. Or if you feel that this is not the way to go, please argue
> your point. I am open to suggestions. TIA
>
>
Message 10 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

For the longest time I thought NGs were just for
posting questions. Didn't know there were some that had answers too. So I didn't
see much sense in participation. <G> Duh!

~Larry


style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
Ah,
ok. Used MDT for years but never visited the NG's back then, or now for that
matter.

Still don't like it. (had to get that last shot back in)

MechMan

Message 11 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

We are here in the same situation as you. We believe, that we could do our
2d works very much faster and get far better results using ACAD Mechnical to
finish the IDW output. But unfortunately, the dwg coming out of IV is so
very far away from any "good" ACAD drawing, that we decided to not go this
way. We choose to ask our customer to be patient and forgiving about the
rather poor drawings they are recieving from us during the current project,
and we decided to go back to MDT for the next projects.
When looking back over the past year's projects we've done, we earned good
money with most of MDT's work, but lost huge time&money with work done in
IV.

Regards,
--
Leo Laimer
Maschinen- und Fertigungstechnik
A-4820 Bad Ischl - Austria



"Purge" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:3387DC19EC6A66791B40AB7A7A25C1F2@in.WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
> Just curious. Anyone out there using both Inventor and Mechanical 6 to
> create your drawings. What I am saying is, using Inventor to create the
> models and generate the views and bom. Then exporting that out to
Mechanical
> 6 to be detailed. Yes, I know the views will not update once it is
exported.
> I feel that Inventor's ability to detail in the idw is still not as strong
> or flexable as it is in a 2D package. Especially when dealing with a lot
of
> circular and cylindrical parts.
>
> So if anyone out there is using both, I would like some of your feedbacks.
> Good and bad. Or if you feel that this is not the way to go, please argue
> your point. I am open to suggestions. TIA
>
>
Message 12 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

While I like the idw environment (since it doesn't crash so much in 5.3 and I
hope subsequent releases and where the customer doesn't have rigid
expectations) I think it's an ABSOLUTE CRYING SHAME that Adesk didn't have the
foresight (or was not so insistant on breaking our dependancy) to develop a
way of linking (xref) IV models back into MDT for drawing generation. It
should have been one of the foundation developement criteria for IV and I
think they missed the boat. Talk about the best of both worlds....

Jeff
===================


"Leo Laimer" wrote in message
news:2A89A929574AF0727D2854CD8738F162@in.WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
We are here in the same situation as you. We believe, that we could do our
2d works very much faster and get far better results using ACAD Mechnical to
finish the IDW output. But unfortunately, the dwg coming out of IV is so
very far away from any "good" ACAD drawing, that we decided to not go this
way. We choose to ask our customer to be patient and forgiving about the
rather poor drawings they are recieving from us during the current project,
and we decided to go back to MDT for the next projects.
When looking back over the past year's projects we've done, we earned good
money with most of MDT's work, but lost huge time&money with work done in
IV.

Regards,
--
Leo Laimer
Maschinen- und Fertigungstechnik
A-4820 Bad Ischl - Austria
Message 13 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

Well put, Jeff.
We often speak about the developement team of IV of a bunch of proud guys
that definitely do EVERYTHING just opposite of the ACAD/MDT team.
You can pick any detail about IV6, if it's fine, watch out the corresponding
detail in ACAD/MDT: It's either weak, or not there at all.
Pick any detail of MDT: If it's fine, its not there at all or terribly weak
in IV.
Shame on Adesk.
Good for us customers that they finally sell both packages in one box, so we
have the choice. But I definitely would prefer the "best from both worlds"
route.

Regards,
--
Leo Laimer
Maschinen- und Fertigungstechnik
A-4820 Bad Ischl - Austria


"Jeff Howard" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:671D43F3225DAB0CB88E5DEEED6FCE73@in.WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
> While I like the idw environment (since it doesn't crash so much in 5.3
and I
> hope subsequent releases and where the customer doesn't have rigid
> expectations) I think it's an ABSOLUTE CRYING SHAME that Adesk didn't have
the
> foresight (or was not so insistant on breaking our dependancy) to develop
a
> way of linking (xref) IV models back into MDT for drawing generation. It
> should have been one of the foundation developement criteria for IV and I
> think they missed the boat. Talk about the best of both worlds....
>
> Jeff
> ===================
>
>
> "Leo Laimer" wrote in message
> news:2A89A929574AF0727D2854CD8738F162@in.WebX.maYIadrTaRb...
> We are here in the same situation as you. We believe, that we could do our
> 2d works very much faster and get far better results using ACAD Mechnical
to
> finish the IDW output. But unfortunately, the dwg coming out of IV is so
> very far away from any "good" ACAD drawing, that we decided to not go this
> way. We choose to ask our customer to be patient and forgiving about the
> rather poor drawings they are recieving from us during the current
project,
> and we decided to go back to MDT for the next projects.
> When looking back over the past year's projects we've done, we earned good
> money with most of MDT's work, but lost huge time&money with work done in
> IV.
>
> Regards,
> --
> Leo Laimer
> Maschinen- und Fertigungstechnik
> A-4820 Bad Ischl - Austria
>
>
>
>
Message 14 of 25
tas
in reply to: Anonymous

I use Inventor all day every day since release 3. I thought when I started and I still think now that Autocad is miles ahead of Inventor when it comes to producing drawings on paper. I take a certain amount of pride in producing professional-looking drawings to give to the shop. Autocad is just plain better in this area. I have always wondered why they didn't make the Inventor 2-d side of things more like autocad. If nothing else, it would give new converts a sense of familiarity.
Message 15 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

Thank you for your input. I will take that into consideration. Great story.
almost fell off my seat. 🙂

"Dennis Jeffrey" wrote in message
news:3DC1B0A8.F14D430B@cadassociates.com...
> Here's a story...... (trying to be funny - but want to make a point - so
don't
> hit me.... )
>
> Once upon a time, there were drafters who created beautiful drawings on
paper.
> About 20 years ago, they started taking notice of this new thing called
CAD.
> Problem was, that since it was a computer, they could not do everything
that
> they could do on a board. They were unhappy.....
>
> However, they did notice one thing. They were FAR more productive on CAD
than
> the board, so they accepted the limitations and moved forward.....
>
> About 15 years ago, those programmers at the CAD companies determined that
users
> would be much more productive if they worked in 3D, so they started
developing
> programs to create wonderful wireframe and surface modelers to improve
> productivity. Unfortunately, the drawing output left much to be desired.
Many
> users of those 3D programs decided to export their 2D geometry to the DWG
format
> so they could continue to give the drawings that "AutoCAD look". Most of
those
> users continue to do that to this very day.
>
> The big problem is that losing associativity will reduce your productivity
> significantly. Fortunately MDT is good at detailing (wasn't always so, but
it
> improved.) and Inventor is catching up quickly.
>
> I understand that companies have "standards", whatever that means to them.
> However we need to understand that we are living in a world of very rapid
> change, and engineering and other departments within companies need to
> compensate for this...
>
> My recommendation? I would not break the associativity, but instead
investigate
> moving as close to your standard in Inventor, and allow for changes in
areas of
> non-conformity. Inventor has improved IDW's with every release, just like
> AutoCAD and MDT has....
>
> Happy Halloween Everyone!
>
> Dennis
>
> Purge wrote:
>
> > Just curious. Anyone out there using both Inventor and Mechanical 6 to
> > create your drawings. What I am saying is, using Inventor to create the
> > models and generate the views and bom. Then exporting that out to
Mechanical
> > 6 to be detailed. Yes, I know the views will not update once it is
exported.
> > I feel that Inventor's ability to detail in the idw is still not as
strong
> > or flexable as it is in a 2D package. Especially when dealing with a lot
of
> > circular and cylindrical parts.
> >
> > So if anyone out there is using both, I would like some of your
feedbacks.
> > Good and bad. Or if you feel that this is not the way to go, please
argue
> > your point. I am open to suggestions. TIA
>
> --
> Dennis Jeffrey
> CAD Associates - Fort Wayne
> Autodesk ASC
> (260-432-9695 x 221
>
>
Message 16 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

I 've still got a paper drawing, one of my latest
76 , I get it out now and again to remind myself that I did iso circle's on
paper, you can still see the pin holes 🙂


--
Laurence,
--


style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
Ooooo,
that was a scary Halloween story at the beginning (paper drawings, 2D CAD).
Glad it had a happier ending.

Paper drawings...that's just a myth isn't it? ISN'T IT!

😉

MechMan

Message 17 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

We have always done that with MDT, write out the views and then detail them in Autocad. We had tried unsuccessfully to use IV IDW's several times. I love the modeling interface compared to MDT, but I have so much more control of the way the drawing looks with ACAD. Besides, ACAD/MDT never corrupts its own files and makes you start all over again.

I could manually detail something in Autocad faster than I could produce a functional IDW in IV when you factor in having to start over after a crash and corrupting the IDW. B
esides, ACAD/MDT doesn't give a sh** what video card I have.

But seriously, the main reason that we stopped using IDW's was the lack of a good viewing/printing utility. The guys on the assembly line need to be able to view and print the assembly drawings of what they are building. When using voloview, the drawings would not display or print correctly, take 1/2 hour to print, and would be missing objects and drawing features. We can't justify giving them a $4000.00 computer and a license of IV just to print drawings.

Vendors had the same problem. As an example, I would add a tolerance to a dimension and save the IDW. They would print the IDW in VV and the tolerance wouldn't be there!
What kind of CAD software would so easily allow you to reproduce inaccurate data?! I might as well go back to cocktail napkins.
That one instance cost me $4000.00 in scrapped parts!

Gee, that's almost enough to buy a seat of Solidworks...hmmm

Good Luck,

Jon Rowley
Message 18 of 25
joemang
in reply to: Anonymous

I do my initial layout in autocad, It is much easier to manipulate entities and checking space for fit. Like checking a distance without using any entities. Once I have a good feel I switch to IVENTOR for the hard line design.
Since I design tooling and one of a kind machines the IDW suit me fine. The visuals I get in inventor sure make it easier to comunicate with customers.
By the way I was born near Salzburg and went to school in Traunstein. How did a Oesterreicher get to write so well in english.
Joe
Message 19 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

This works for us.

Design in IV
Detail in idw.
Plot and check.
Make changes & convert to acad.
Clean up dims and layers.
Back check and ship.

I agree that Acad produces better 2d drawings and is easier to work with. There are some cool things though that idw's can do that acad cannot. Iso. views, easy section generation. Center lines are a brease etc.
As far as assembly's go if there big dont even bother with idws. Get the views you need and work in Acad. Unless you like to watch paint dry.

Rumor. Maybe better idw or acad link or acad like interface in 7?

One thing I can say. If they would have left the 2d side associative to acad they would rule the world right now.
Message 20 of 25
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

Have you ever heard of PDF files?  They seem
to be pretty universal these days - kind of like a jpg file.  You see, you
just print using the PDF printer and voila, you have a PDF file that even your
mother could open and print out.  Costs a whole lot less than buying a new
computer and IV copy./

 


style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">

But seriously, the main reason that we stopped using IDW's was the lack of
a good viewing/printing utility. The guys on the assembly line need to be able
to view and print the assembly drawings of what they are building.

Can't find what you're looking for? Ask the community or share your knowledge.

Post to forums  

Autodesk Design & Make Report