Assembly appearances

[MiSt2047]

Hello

I have an assembly (A) that has a subassembly (B) that has a pattern of subassemblies (C's) that consist of many parts (D, E, F, G & H).

The parts (DEFGH) are steel and have their own drawings. They do and should look like steel.

They are welded together as an assembly (C). This will be painted bright yellow. I wish to assign a yellow appearance to the subassembly, not affecting the parts.

Last, when I open the upper assemblies (A or B), I expect C to have the painted color.

I cannot make this work in Inventor 2013.

I can assign appearances to parts DEFGH. No error there.

I can NOT assign appearances to assemblies (C). The only thing I see in the Appearance box is "Favourites" and "Inventor Material Library".

I can individuall select and highlight parts DEFGH inside the assembly C and assign an appearance to them. Sort of a work-around, but...

...this is not carried through to upper assemblies (A or B). If I just open them, all items are steel-colored, not yellow.

If choose to edit one of the patterned C's inside B, only that instance is colored. None of the others in the pattern.

I must thus expand every instance in the pattern and highlight every part and set an appearance. But this is still not carried through to A. Or any of several other assemblies that also contain B.

Thus, if I want a persistent coloring, I either have to "paint" the individual parts, or I will have to scour up each and every assembly and "paint" every part inside them.

Is there really no way to assign an appearance to an assembly and have it carried through automatically to all assemblies that contain it? Like in every other solid modeler I have ever used?

Thanks for any feedback,

/Some Guy

[BLHDrafting]

You can't apply an override ot the pattern C. You need to assign the override at each level of C by selecting it in the model tree, RMB, Representation and change Design View Rep from Master to Default.

You may also need to do this at assy levels B and A also.

[mpatchus]

Try creating a Representation of the color you desire in the Weldment.

Then create the same Representation in the assembly where used and use the Yellow representation for the weldment being patterned.

You can easily switch back and forth between representations at any time.

[MiSt2047]

I will thus have to recreate the representation in every assembly I need it?

Not perfect, but better than nothing. Thank you for the suggestion!