I have a collaboration issue- I’m trying to get a PCB design to our layout person, who is using PADS. I have linked him to the file, and this is what he sees trying to import the DXF that Fusion generates. Units are correct.
I’ve also tried DWG from the drawing module, with the same result. Does anyone have any ideas?
Thanks,
One problem that's come up with DXF exports is there's no unit information in the file so the program opening the file will need some way of setting on import. Also how are you exporting a DWG, is it a 2d drawing or a 3d model.
Note. The DXF unit problem is an export of a sketch, i'm not sure about an export from Dashboard.
Mark.
Mark Hughes
Owner, Hughes Tooling
Did you find this post helpful? Feel free to Like this post.
Did your question get successfully answered? Then click on the ACCEPT SOLUTION button.
I’ve tried exporting both DWG from a 2D drawing and DXF from the 3D file, with the same results.
I’m wondering if it may be a version issue- Fusion gives no options for DXF export. We have tried importing the DXF now into several applications, with no luck. Some gave an “unsupported version” error. However I imported a STEP file of the circuit board into my old copy of Ashlar Cobalt, then exported a DXF from that program. Cobalt gives a number of version options for DXF export. An older DXF version worked for import into several other applications, though at this point I haven’t found one that works with PADS.
When it comes to collaboration in the real world, getting useable output to PCB layout programs like PADS or Altium is a huge issue. The linking to the file, the viewer, and being able to have the layout person download a file all works great in Fusion to a point, but so far has ended in frustration. Coupled with the really incomplete current implementation of drawings- with no ability to add lines, curves, or other graphical annotations to,say, indicate keep-out areas- this leaves me having to take the Fusion file into another CAD program like Cobalt or SolidWorks in order to get useable output, either as a file or even a 2D drawing.
DWG files from the drawing module will only open with Autocad, see these links.
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/design-and-documentation/dwg-issues-opening-in-draftsight/td-p/5602156
Mark.
Mark Hughes
Owner, Hughes Tooling
Did you find this post helpful? Feel free to Like this post.
Did your question get successfully answered? Then click on the ACCEPT SOLUTION button.
Thanks much for that offer, Lewis. While I don’t use SW myself, there are others involved in this project who do, so if needed I can get them to generate files. It’s just frustrating that it should be necessary when everything up to the point of getting the file works so well for cross-discipline collaboration. I’d done kind of a selling job about Fusion and collaboration for this project, and it looks kind of silly when it fails with the last, essential bit. Granted, electronics packages are probably the worst when it comes to file compatibility, but that’s the reality of the environment we work in.
I had not tried to really use the drawings module until just now, at least for anything complex that mattered, and I was dumbfounded, and confounded, by the bizarreness of the UI. I can understand it not having all the features I’d like to see, it’s new. But it is hard to understand why some actions that should be simple to access take such a weird sequence of right-click, confirm (“continue” as an interstitial message when I want to edit a dimension? Maybe I was kidding?), left-click on a little icon- when a simple double click to edit/ move would be so much more consistent with Fusion and the rest of the world. I’d love to be part of a UX study on that module. For now, I’ll be doing drawings in Cobalt/ Graphite.
Fusion has come a long ways, and I’m a big fan of it and the team. I’m convinced it’s the right program for many of us, certainly for me. I’d really like to see some of these rough edges fixed so it can fulfill its promise of being a full design environment.
