Automatic creation of drawings of mirrored components

[livewire77]

I often have assemblies with large number of mirrored components. It takes me several days to make drawings of these mirrored components. It would be nice to create these drawings by mirroring the drawings of the original components , because these original drawings have been already created. Only the text must be in proper direction (left to right or right to left depending on language) . All the placement of views , sketches, remarks and so on can be mirrored.  User would only arrange their position a little to avoid possible overlapping with the title block or to place them in the correct position, but this is still much easier than creating the complete drawings. This must work for all kind of components including sheet metal flat patterns - although I know that they are same as original , but their orientation should be oposite (most of my components are the sheet metal assemblies).

[G.L.R.]

I've created a part and worked hours on drawing it.
Now i need a drawing of its mirror.
In order to save me another couple of hours, is there an option to create it automatically from a drawing I already have, without losing all the annotations ?

glr

[joaoasilvapinto]

Hi!

I don't know this can help you, but I would do the following, after having the DWG fully annotated of one part:

1. Create a new DWG;

2. Copy the sheet you have done for the new DWG file;

3. Go to, in the new DWG file, "Manage -> Modify (Replace Model Reference)" and replace the part/assembly with you new mirrored part/assembly.

I believe that, by doing this you can save time and just have to rearrange the dimensions.

When all is done, just copy+paste this new sheet to your "master" DWG file.

Hope this helps!

João 

[G.L.R.]

hi João
thank you
but when you change the reference model with a derivative mirrored files, all dimensions will be lost
at least that is what I checked,
or something I do not understand

gianluca

[DRoam]

Hi @G.L.R.. I just did a quick test, and when I did a Replace Model Reference to replace my original Part with a Derived mirror, all of my dimensions stayed associated except for a Chamfer annotation. So you might be doing something wrong there.

However, I tested another method which actually kept the Chamfer annotation and is probably more robust overall. This is the method:

1. You have your original file that you modeled. Call it Original.ipt.
2. Derive Original.ipt into a new part, but leave it as the same "hand" as you originally modeled it. Call it Original_Derived.ipt.
3. Derive Original.ipt into a new part, and mirror it about the appropriate plane to get the opposite "hand". Call it Mirrored_Derived.ipt.
4. When you make your drawing, use Original_Derived.ipt. Make all your dimensions and annotations, etc.
5. Create a copy of this drawing file and use the "Replace Model Reference", and choose Mirrored_Derived.ipt as your replacement.
6. Hopefully most of your dimensions and annotation will stay associated.

I'd recommend trying that and see how it works for you.

[G.L.R.]

thanks João and DRoam

I created a video where I put together what normally happens and your suggestions.

http://a360.co/2aHnuat  (mirror_workaround.swf )

thanks for the nice workaround.

although it will not solve all the problems it is already a step forward.

Gianluca

[dusan.naus.trz]

Could it work like here ?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BTNW1utqZA

[Fouad-l]

I would like to have a button to generate a drawing of a symmetric part directly from the original part.

[DRoam]

@Fouad-l, please see this comment that I made on a duplicate of this Idea.

I did that method with your Part and it works fairly well.

Here is the original drawing. On the left-hand side is the original Part, and on the right-hand side is the un-modified Derived version of the original (the result of Step 2 in my post).

And here is the result after I did a Replace Model Reference on both instances and replaced them with the Derived mirror:

As you can see, the replacement of the Derived version kept all of the dimensions. And the top and bottom dimensions look perfect. Only the side dimensions need some adjustment. This is expected as those are the sides that flipped about the mirrored plane, so it would be expecting a lot to expect Inventor to know where to place them. This is where a dedicated drawing-mirror tool would come into play. Hopefully little case studies like this will help the Autodesk team know what kind of smarts they'll have to build into a drawing-mirror tool, if they ever decide to do so.

In the meantime, using the method I described in my other comment works pretty well for getting you started.

[Fouad-l]

@DRoam, Thank you very much for your suggestion.
The method you mentioned above works perfectly for simple parts, is the unique method i know so far to do that.
I Usually work with complex parts created from sheet metal, i tried this method but it doesn't work very well.
I was wondering if Autodesk can give us that potential tool to facilitate our day to day work, given that other software platforms already done it.

[Andrew2803]

@Fouad-l

Why don't you use Retrieve dimensions? It needs though a well built up/positioned sketch...

Derived mirror part keeps parent sketch dimension's place in respect, just tried it.

[Fouad-l]

Hi @Andrew2803.

This option may be useful for flate parts. i Normally work with complex bended parts, so this option isn't enough for me.

I Created the simple part above to simplify the idea. But the Tool needed has to work for any kind of parts independently of its complexity.

[dusan.naus.trz]

Could it work like here? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6sTTgioJAc

or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znCjG312LPI

[Fouad-l]

 Hi @dusan.naus.trz.

Videos you mentioned above talk about mirroring the view of same parte. my suggestion is about getting drawings of two mirrored parts.

[phlyx]

Was about to post this same thing.  We do a lot of gripper jaws that are sets with one mirrored and creating the mirrored drawing is always a pain.  Replacing part give you views but they are all the same view so different faces and if one out of 50 dimensions come thru we're surprised.  Being able to mirror a drawing WITH DIMENSIONS would save us a ton of time.  Some of our jaws get kind of complicated.

[Yijiang.Cai]

Many thanks for posting the idea, and tracked as [INVGEN-74362]