Created Simplified Part from Assembly But it is Not Visible

[dfitzgerald2002]

Hi all,

I'm still trying to create a simplified part from an assembly in order to have the part 3D printed. After correcting a constraint error on my assembly, I thought that my assembly was complete and ready to go. I opened the assembly file, clicked on the SIMPLIFY button, and waited for Inventor to make the new part file. Inventor did create a new (simplified) part file but there is no visible part in the field of view.

There were no error messages during the SIMPLIFY conversion. However, there is a lightning bolt next to the original assembly file at the bottom of the model tree (See attached screenshot of the Simplified Part Model Tree).  When I hover the mouse over the lightning bolt, a pop-up says, "Needs Update." NOTE: I have tried the SIMPLIFY process several times. I even obtain a simplified part with NO lightning bold at the bottom of the model tree, but none of the simplified parts are viewable.

I have also attached a screenshot of the original assembly file, including the expanded model tree. (If it helps)

I went back to the folder containing every part, including every revision of every part associated with this assembly, and opened them up in Inventor, one by one, to make sure that the path for the reference (children?) files could be found and were up-to-date within Inventor.

I'm out of ideas and exhausted. I greatly appreciate any help.

David

[chris]

@dfitzgerald2002 Is the Create Simplified the only option you've tried? Have you tried to derive the assembly to a single part with no seam lines?

[James_Willo]

Two things to check:

Did you use 'no simplification?'

If you did simplify something, check what is being removed by clicking highlight. (Make sure it doesn't highlight everything)

[dfitzgerald2002]

Chris,

Thanks for your responses along the way. I didn't want to try to derive a part because based on the previous responses where everyone said that both methods would give the same result, I didn't have any confidence that I would get a different result. Also (as a practical person), I don't want to be an expert. I'm just trying to make a single part.

However, it turns out that my lack of knowledge, combined with my ADHD, caused me to overlook one of the choices of simplifying a part. When I chose the Simplification menu, I selected the Simplify button right below the menu which gave me lots of options from which to choose. Today, I was a little more observant and saw a choice at the bottom of the Simplification menu which stated, "Create Simplified Part." The choices I was given were: 1) to name the new file and, 2) where to put the new file. -----> It worked and I have my simplified part!

Thanks again,

David

[dfitzgerald2002]

James,

Thank you for your help with my questions. Your recent response caused me to explore a little more because I didn't know what highlight meant, or how to do it. It helped me find an article that better described what I was trying to do. (It's amazing to me that how I phrase my search in Google gives me completely different search results. I previously changed several terms in the search and got the same results over and over agiain, but this time I reworded my search and found what I needed.

Instead of using the Simplfy button under the Simplification pull-down menu, I selected "Create Simplificed Part" and everything worked!

Thanks,

David

[James_Willo]

Derive is  mainly used so you can reuse parts of your design and when the geometry updates in the first file, the derive will also update. 

Simplify is normally used at the end and it's purpose is to...simplify. 

Maybe you're sending something to a 3rd party, you don't want them to reverse engineer your product and work out how to manufacturer it themselves. You can automatically delete all the parts inside.

Maybe you're sending to Revit or it's just a massive file and you need to improve system performance. The remove feature section uses shape recognition to remove features (so it also works on imported geometry.) Normally I would have to have the fillet or hole in the browser and then I'd suppress it. Simplify will recognise these shapes automatically and remove all of them regardless of what feature they were drawn in. 

As you found out, there are 3 output files. 

New part / substitute / RVT

New part just makes a new part.

Sub makes a new part, but links it to the current assembly by placing a browser node in the model states section of the browser. 

RVT creates a Revit file.