Building a box the right way™

[sterfield]

Hey folks,

Up until now, here's how I was designing a box : creating a "bottom" component, creating a sketch in it, extruding, then creating a "side" component, creating a sketch from the "bottom" body, extruding it, etc…

It works, but @laughingcreek recently said, that it was not a very robust way of designing. If for any reason, one component is deleted, then all other components will fail, as there will be tons of dependencies between them.

This advise is also mentioned by @chrisplyler in this thread.

So I tried to change the way I'm designing, and started to use a central sketch used by sub-components.

Let's say we are designing a rectangular cuboid. The new workflow would be :

• creating a new sketch, designing the size of the cuboid and four sides (back, front, left and right)
• then extruding the bottom in a separate component
• then extruding all sides

Now, it's a cuboid, which means that "left" and "right" bodies will be identical ("front" and "back" will be identical as well).

If I'm creating two different components, they will be considered as different, while identical in dimension.

If I'm creating one component and extruding both sides at the same time, I'll end up with 2 bodies with the same dimensions, but considered as the same component.

My problem is, when I'm creating a drawing from this design, I would like to have the parts list showing the part "side" with a quantity of 2. But the only way to do this (as far as I know) is to create a copy of the "side" component and placing it manually in the correct spot. But that makes the "parent" sketch kind of useless for the second wall and looks weird as a way to design this box.

So am I doing something wrong here ?

How to design a simple box, using a central sketch and with several "instances" of the components when applicable, in order to have a correct parts list ?

Thanks a lot for your help !

[Beyondforce]

Hey @sterfield ,

Please watch this and let me know if you have more questions.

https://youtu.be/UJqV_JT0Ll8

[sterfield]

Hey @Beyondforce, awesome video !

Your content is great and this concept is well explained

However, I know the difference between copy / paste / paste new for bodies and components.

My question is more regarding a generic workflow when building something, if you want to have an accurate BOM.

Right now, the only solution I found was to create a "side" component / body from the sketch, then copy / paste the component and move it in the right location. As shown in your video, it works and provide a correct BOM, but I don't know why, this sounds a little bit sketchy (no pun intended), as there's already all the dimension and geometries in the "parent" sketch.

Thanks !

[Beyondforce]

In order to count something in the BOM, it must be a component. The sketches have nothing to do with the BM or drawings. F360 is the most simple system to work with and some people have a tendency to complicate things!
If you have a specific file that you want me to check out, then please attach it.

[chrisplyler]

You could copy/paste it as you described, but instead of manually Moving it into position, Joint it into position.

Or, instead of copy/paste, you could Mirror it or Rectangular Pattern it, or Circular Pattern it, depending on its shape and the desired orientation.

[laughingcreek · Accepted solution]

like @chrisplyler says -patterns or copy/joint work. (or even copy, gasp. move.  the move needs to be a one of the parametric types though, I'm a fan of point to point b/c I can use the points in my sketchs)

keep in mind mirror creates a unique component.

attached is an example done for somebody else a while back.  it uses circular patterns.  one of them patterns out extra legs that I then joint into place.

3 unique parts in BOM, seven total parts.  everything controlled by first 2 sketches.

(NOT my saw horse design)

[chrisplyler]

---

@laughingcreek wrote:

keep in mind mirror creates a unique component.

---

Oh yeah. I forgot that bit. Duh. Wasn't thinking on full power.

[sterfield]

Ok, thanks for the feedback, everyone.

Bottom line is : "yes, it's acceptable to copy / paste / pattern a component, even if you could create directly from a sketch", and that's the only correct way to create several identical components.

I guess I now need to change my design process 🙂

[chrisplyler]

Yeah, Fusion doesn't do any automatic "recognition" to see if any two or more Components are exactly the same, so the only way it knows is if you make them in one of these ways.