I am trying to help a coworker with some Vault issues and myself am just relearning Vault with a new implementation.
He had the original assembly, which already had a drawing done. He used the original assembly, used Copy Design from within Vault, and made minimal changes, and renamed the new assembly (also within Vault). When he tried to Copy Design for the original drawing and used Replace Model Reference, it still broke most all the dimensions like the models didn't match up.
What is the best way to reuse existing drawings through Vault?
In my experience, Replace Model Reference does often nuke dimensions, unless the parts are virtually identical. Even then there are no guarentees. Plus bear in mind that you will have to remove any Parts Lists and balloons, as they still reference the BOM of the old assembly. It's not a perfect clean switch out, but it can get you closer than starting over.
It sounds like you did everything right, except I usually do my copy design from the top level drawing, not the assembly. Copy Design on a drawing brings basically the entire design including any other drawings associated with the design. For example, our systems are designed in 3 layers: Frame, Equipment and Full Assembly. If I Copy Design the Full Assembly idw, everything including the Frame and Equipment idw's is included. Saves you having to do 2 copy designs, and also would save you having to do a Replace Model.
Good luck!
Chris Benner
Inventor Tube & Pipe, Vault Professional
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Similar to the workflow mentioned by cbenner, I copy design the assy file and the documentation (IDW's) come along with it. This is controlled by the choice of "Include related documentation" in the Settings. See the picture.
I do it on the assy and then choose if I want the IDW's also as I am usually doing different trial configurations and just want the assy/part files. I can reconstruct the IDW later.
2 different workflows, similar results. 1 of the benefits of Vault!
Although not clearly stated I think the command "Replace Model Reference" is a drawing environment feature that is primarily designed to work with part files.
@BLHDrafting wrote:
Although not clearly stated I think the command "Replace Model Reference" is a drawing environment feature that is primarily designed to work with part files.
I think that's a fair statement. We have used it with assemblies, but there's always a bit more cleanup that when using it with parts.
Chris Benner
Inventor Tube & Pipe, Vault Professional
Cad Tips Tricks & Workarounds | Twitter | LinkedIn
Autodesk University Classes:
Going With The Flow with Inventor Tube and Pipe | Increasing The Volume with Inventor Tube and Pipe | Power of the Autodesk Community | Getting to Know You | Inventor Styles & Standards |Managing Properties with Vault Professional | Vault Configuration | Vault - What is it & Why Do I Need It? | A Little Less Talk - Tube & Pipe Demo | Change Orders & Revisions - Vault, Inventor & AutoCAD | Authoring & Publishing Custom Content
We are just trying to use the Replace Component Reference in the drawing- I don't know that I knew you had the option in a part (?).
The assemblies were virtually identical, which is why I was surpised to see so many dimensions lost- they normally stay when the assemblies are that similar.
Also, I have had a mixed bag of results with the BOM updating to the newly referenced part, but I haven't found a rhyme or reason as to why the BOM does or doesn't update correctly.