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: 

Sheet Metal Extents

46 REPLIES 46
SOLVED
Reply
Message 1 of 47
JohnKHouston
2685 Views, 46 Replies

Sheet Metal Extents

Hi all,

 

We've recently upgraded to Inventor 2015 and tried to install the AddIn to create the custom property sheet metal extents but we're not able to generate the values anymore.

 

The AddIn is showing as installed and loaded but it does not update the values. I've tried installing the addin from a local drive rather than a network drive but that doesn't seem to have had any effect.

 

Any suggestions on what can be done?

 

Thanks in advance,

John Houston

46 REPLIES 46
Message 2 of 47
mrattray
in reply to: JohnKHouston

I think the add-in you're referring to is obsolete. What is it you're trying to accomplish? We may be able to propose an alternate solution.
Mike (not Matt) Rattray

Message 3 of 47
JohnKHouston
in reply to: mrattray

Hi Mike,

We're just looking to have the sheet metal extents shown for the flat patterns so that we can use that info in our material info.

Of course I can add a sketch and use the ref. dimn's but it would be preferred to have it done automagically!

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!
Message 4 of 47
johnsonshiue
in reply to: JohnKHouston

Hi! There is no longer a need to use an Add-In or creating driven dimensions to get Sheet Metal Extents (been true for quite a few releases already). In the sheet metal part, you can add custom iProperties to get the extents. The syntax is like the following.

 

Custom iProperty Name: MyFlatArea (or any name of your choice)

Value: = <FLAT PATTERN AREA>

 

You do the same for length and width.

 

In drawing, these properties are also available for text or annotation, when there is a view referencing the sheet metal part flat pattern.

Thanks!

 



Johnson Shiue (johnson.shiue@autodesk.com)
Software Test Engineer
Message 5 of 47
JohnKHouston
in reply to: johnsonshiue

Thanks for the information.

I'd like to confirm that the syntax is <FLAT PATTERN WIDTH> ; <FLAT PATTERN LENGTH> and <FLAT PATTERN AREA>, with spaces as shown.

I was able to extract a value using these parameters but the values weren't even close to being correct. I'm not at all sure what they were but they weren't the extents of my part.

One other question, how would I format the result? It's shown as a 4 decimal value but I would want it to be shown as fractional.

Thanks for your help.
Message 6 of 47
mrattray
in reply to: JohnKHouston

That should be correct, can you post an example file here?
Mike (not Matt) Rattray

Message 7 of 47
JohnKHouston
in reply to: mrattray

Sure, here ya go.

 

It finds the length okay, just doesn't have the correct width.

 

I still would need a way to parse the unit string as well as make the value fractional.

 

FWIW, the SME addin was much easier.  😉  🙂

 

Thanks for your help.

Message 8 of 47
dlmsdm1
in reply to: JohnKHouston

I just tried the "Flat Pattern Width" and it didn't work for me either. 

I use: =<SHEET METAL LENGTH> & =<SHEET METAL WIDTH>

 

 

Message 9 of 47
JohnKHouston
in reply to: dlmsdm1

Yeah, that works.

Now I need a way to correct the unit string and change the value to fractional from decimal.

Thanks for the help!
Message 10 of 47
mrattray
in reply to: JohnKHouston

The only way I know of to do that is with iLogic. You'll need to create user parameters, assign the value using iLogic, and then use the export parameter option with it's formatting options to get a property formatted the way you require.

 

Capture.JPG

 

Capture2.JPG

 

lengthExtents = SheetMetal.FlatExtentsLength
widthExtents = SheetMetal.FlatExtentsWidth

 

Capture3.JPG

 

 

Mike (not Matt) Rattray

Message 11 of 47
JohnKHouston
in reply to: mrattray

Well we're getting much closer. Now all I need to do is figure out how to add the iLogic portion of your post.

Sure appreciate the help I'm getting from everybody.
Message 12 of 47
mrattray
in reply to: JohnKHouston

Capture.JPG

Capture2.JPG

Mike (not Matt) Rattray

Message 13 of 47
JohnKHouston
in reply to: mrattray

Yeah, I had that part figured out, lol. 🙂

I was finally able to figure out how to setup the rule and have it update my custom parameters.

Thanks once again for your help, Mike (not Matt). 🙂
Message 14 of 47
johnsonshiue
in reply to: JohnKHouston

Hi! My prior reply did not include an example and it led to some confusion. Attached is an example showing how to extract sheet metal extents without using any Add-Ins. The tricky thing here is how to get the extents readout properly formatted. The readouts are cm based. If you simply apply column formatting in partslist, the result might be off. It is because the the partslist looks for the unit setting in part document settings and then do the conversion. In order to have the correct readout, simply change the sheet metal part document setting to cm. Next, in the parslist, apply the desirable unit formatting to the column.

Please take a look at attached example created on R2010. Let me know if you have any question.

Thanks!



Johnson Shiue (johnson.shiue@autodesk.com)
Software Test Engineer
Message 15 of 47
karthur1
in reply to: johnsonshiue

Johnson,

That works fine for new parts and if I was updating my sheetmetal template.  But these custom iproperties are not in hundreds of legacy parts that we have. Thats the thing about using the addin.  It works on existing legacy parts and newly created parts equally well (when it works).

 

There is no additional steps that the user has to do (like create the custom iproperties or run an external ilogic code).

 

Kirk

Message 16 of 47
mrattray
in reply to: karthur1

I have my own custom external iLogic code that automatically propagates itself. It's like an engineered Inventor virus.
I'll share if your interested. But, it's not simple.
Mike (not Matt) Rattray

Message 17 of 47
karthur1
in reply to: mrattray

"automatically propagates itself"..... sure

Message 18 of 47
karthur1
in reply to: mrattray

Mike,

Were you going to share the iLogic code?  If you dont want to post here, you could send me a PM.

 

Thanks,

Kirk

 

 

Message 19 of 47
karthur1
in reply to: johnsonshiue

I have a little time and would like to try and get this issue resolved.  I really need the "SheetMetalExtents" add-in to work like it did in the past.  The nice thing about this is that it would write the extents values to the part parameters. I have weldments that have both sheetmetal and regular parts in them. In order to get the information on the parts list like Johnson is doing it, would require me to have a special column for the width and length just for the sheetmetal parts.  Would make for a very messy parts list on the weldment.

 

I just dont see a way to do what I need to do without the add-in working correctly.  It will have to work on new parts and legacy sheetmetal parts that already have detail drawings made for them.  By no means would I say that the add-in is obsolete.

 

I do use some iLogic code now..... not real fond of it because sometimes it looses the path to the file and I get errors when I save (because the trigger is set to "before save"). Even if the ilogic is the solution for new files, I have hundreds of legacy files that the iLogic code is not setup in.  For those, I would have to go into each file and manually set the trigger.

 

Still looking for a solution....

Kirk

Message 20 of 47
mrattray
in reply to: karthur1

I don't know anything about the add-in, so I can't help you with it.

 

Did you take a look at the code I PM'd you before? If you set it up like I have mine then it does everything you're asking for.

I've never had any issues with "not finding the path". The way mine is set-up it automatically creates the trigger in the file. All that is required is to open the file, open the external form that I have created and click the button I have on it. Everything is seamlessly automated. If that's not easy enough, you could use MegaJerk's code injector to mass update your legacy files.

Mike (not Matt) Rattray

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

Post to forums  

Autodesk Design & Make Report