How to activate and edit one and only one instance of component?

[shawn.parella]

I am working on a component that is part of a large assembly. The component is used over 100 times in the assembly. It is not a linked component. I make edits to the component, which are reflected in all instances, which is the desired behavior. I can isolate one component instance and activate it, but when I make edits to it, Fusion appears to be editing all instances of the hidden components/bodies at the same time, which is causing crippling performance issues for my workstation (i7 w/Quadro). 

For example, if I hover over feature in the timeline, the feature is highlighted over 100 times even though I have only one instance shown and active. 

If it were a linked component, I would simply open the component by itself to edit, but this one is a sub-component of the master assembly file. I'm wondering if there is a way to work on a part in a manner similar to working on a linked component so that I can make my edits and then update them to the assembly when I am done.

[etfrench]

Generally speaking, a component which needs to be different than the original should be created with Copy/Paste New.  This allows you to modify it without changing the original or other clones.  If you need to make a change to the original which also needs to be propagated to the copy, then move the timeline to a position before the copy was made.

[shawn.parella]

Paste New is definitely handy, but not applicable here.

The timeline idea would normally be a workable solution but,

The model was originally imported from a solidworks assembly, so I stay away from this imported group which contains hundreds of features.

[etfrench]

In that case just do a Copy/Paste New on the copy, then remove or hide the original copy.

[shawn.parella]

I need all of the instances to update based on the changes I make. In my experience Paste New would break that association. Am I misunderstanding?

[jhackney1972]

If you are not opposed to using all linked components you can use the Save As and Replace command to make one component unique while all the others are linked and you can use Edit in Place to modify any one of them.  To identify any  components as unique you could change the appearance of to keep them straight.

[etfrench]

I misread your first post.  I thought you wanted to modify only  one instance of the component.

One thing you could try  is grounding everything else while you're modifying the component.  This should reduce the amount of computing needed when changes are made.  Create a selection set of all the grounded components to make it easy  to toggle the grounded state.

[shawn.parella]

I am not opposed to using linked components, I'm just not sure how to get there from here. The components in question are currently sub-components and not linked components, so Save As and Replace is not an option in the right click menu.

Also, since this machine build uses over a hundred of this component, I need to maintain feature association between instances. Making one linked part and editing it wouldn't update all the other instances with the revisions made to the new linked part. Unless... I could somehow replace all instances at the same time with one linked part.

[jhackney1972]

I do not think you will have the option to update your current assembly to this method.  There is no way to replace multiple components that are a part of your assembly, the command Save As and Replace works only on Linked components.   You will just have to save the idea for the next time you create a similar assembly.

[shawn.parella · Accepted solution]

I selected the component in question and then did invert selection, made a selection set, and grounded it. Grounding the set added 1600 pins to the timeline, though activating the component cleared up the timeline view. I made some edits and then deleted the pins. I'm not sure that it improved system performance though.

I have discovered something different that has improved performance. Normally, I make changes by editing the sketches and features in active part's timeline. This causes the features of all instances to highlight and become pseudo-active. If I edit the sketches by clicking in the browser tree, only the isolated & active component's sketch becomes visible. Seeing and editing one sketch at a time instead of seeing 100 sketches on the screen at once is much more manageable.

Features are not listed in the browser tree but they can instead be accessed by right clicking on the model and clicking "edit feature". This method also works for editing some profile sketches. Working in this way, the system is responsive enough to be productive again. 

[kb9ydn]

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@shawn.parella wrote:

I have discovered something different that has improved performance. Normally, I make changes by editing the sketches and features in active part's timeline. This causes the features of all instances to highlight and become pseudo-active. If I edit the sketches by clicking in the browser tree, only the isolated & active component's sketch becomes visible. Seeing and editing one sketch at a time instead of seeing 100 sketches on the screen at once is much more manageable. 

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I'm running into this issue myself.  But it seems that now (almost 2025) selecting the sketch from the tree shows every instance of the component in the 'editing' state, which is annoying.  Even worse it's switching context to the first instance of the component in the assembly and editing that one, even though it was initially hidden.  Technically I guess it's ok since I do want to edit all of the instances, but the context switch is seriously bizarre and rather confusing.

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