Work without timeline

[rsamvelyan]

Hello

I'm building a robotic arm. I design the components separately in their own separate files and then assemble them all in another file (I called it Assembly) - paste new.

I noticed that my assembly file is becoming heavier with every new component. The timeline is growing and recalculations are taking more and more time. 

What is the best practice when it comes to assembling say a mechanism like my robotic arm? 

Am I doing it the correct way? Shall I maybe disable the timeline in the assembly file?

Any ideas? 

Thanks! 

[jeff_strater]

@rsamvelyan - yes, that is one possible strategy that can help - if your top-level assembly is just a collection of components modeled separately, it can be more efficient to make that top level history-free (Direct Modeling).  Obviously, there are costs to that - you lose the ability to do position-based modeling, or associative Edit in Place.  But, if you are struggling with pure assembly performance, this can sometimes help.

[TrippyLighting]

While I agree with @jeff_strater it sounds like there is something else going on in your model. As such it would be helpful if you could share the model in a downloadable form

[rsamvelyan]

Thanks a lot for getting back to me.

Here is the assembly file.

If you have any other suggestions or any constructive input in general as far as my design is concerned please share it with me. 

Here's an example of a dilemma I'm facing. I need to start modeling the holes where the pulleys will be attached. 

Is it better to do it in a completely separate file, and then when ready drop it into the assembly file? 

It's not practical though if I need to make adjustments to the positions of the holes. I will have to go back and forth between files.  I wish there was a way to dynamically link the model to its file of origin. That way I could quickly do the adjustments in the original file and have the model changed in the assembly file. 

All I want is to make it simpler and lighter. It seems to be a bit heavy.

Thanks!

[laughingcreek]

at first glance I would say the rather large number of position captures is your primary  performance issue.  They are computationally heavy, and a design like this shouldn't have any.

[etfrench · Accepted solution]

Use Insert Derive to share parameters and possibly bodies and sketches between components.  If you have parameters which only apply to a sub-assembly, create a file for that sub-assembly.  If the parameters apply to the entire project, then create a file for those parameters.

[TrippyLighting]

As @laughingcreek has already mentioned there should be no position chapturer features in this design and I'll add that there should be no move commands in the timeline either.

You'll need o to learn to use the joints in the Assemble menu and assemble components more or less directly after you have created them.

[TheCADWhisperer]

Sketch is unconstrained?

Do not pattern sketch elements, pattern features or faces instead.

[rsamvelyan]

I think you have an good point here about using the joints. I will definitely look into that.
So far I have been moving the components and using the align tool to fine tune their position. I guess this is the wrong way. And that must be why the software always asks me if I want to capture the position.

[rsamvelyan]

I re-assembled the entire thing from scratch. It was time consuming. I got rid of most of my position captures. It's pretty swift and light now. 

The point regarding the using joints instead makes sense. I must have neglected it and instead have used move and align in order the assemble the components together. I reckon this is what has generated all these annoying position captures. 

I still have a few of these though. 

I have also had entire components disappearing or moving to their original positions. That too must be caused by the same thing.

[rsamvelyan]

Why should I not use patterns on Sketch elements? What's the reason behind? 

[etfrench]

Each and every Move needs to be recalculated every time a change is made in the file.  Moves, for the most part, are not parametric so they don't update when changes are made.

Patterns in sketches if used should be very small.  They really bog down Fusion 360, whereas patterning features, bodies, or components are more forgiving.

I only resort to Direct Modeling (no Timeline) when Fusion 360 slows down.  When I first started with Fusion 360, that happened quite often.  It's been a long time since I've had to do that.

[rsamvelyan]

So I followed all the advice from everyone here and it fixed all my problems.

- I started creating the components right where they are supposed to be, referencing their distances and dimensions based off of their adjacent components right in the sketch.

- I started attaching / fixing the components together by using the joints

- Also tried insert derive which is a nice feature. Unfortunately Fusion 360 keeps on crashing when I want to change their appearance. 

- Not using patterns inside the sketch also helped speeding things up.

- Another thing I figured is instead of duplicating components, I mirror the body inside the component. 

Thanks a lot to everyone for your advice it really helped me fix the madness in my designs.