Inventor Content Center

[Anonymous]

Good day everyone,

I'm struggeling to edit content center files of drawings that already existed for quite some time in my company. 

I can't seem to find a quick way to edit them or I might be looking at the wrong place.

Is it even possible to quick edit saved content center drawings? Or do I have to delete the old drawing and re-add the new one? Any advice is welcome, since I'm fairly new with Inventor.. 

Thanks!

[freesbee]

...would you be so kind to explain what you mean by "content center drawing"?

I have done any sort of perverse action with the content center (below just a few examples), and I can confirm that it can only handle "parts". So I am in trouble to understand what you mean by "content center drawing"

 

[Anonymous]

My apologies for the misleading information, I do indeed mean 'Parts', below an example. 

[mikejones]

Have you made changes to the CC table of one of the parts and you're not seeing those changes in your actual part file? If that's the case then you need to refresh the files. Open an assembly that contains some of the CC parts and go to MANAGE tab; Content Center; Refresh. That will refresh the files in the current assembly.

You can also change a setting in the Application Options under the Content Center tab to refresh standard parts during placement.

And for a global update of all content center files, I think you can do that as a task in the Task Scheduler which you'll find under the start menu under the inventor folder.

If it's something else then I'm stuck.

Mike

[freesbee]

...yes, that's the way to do it.

In this small example you see a few screws which have been authored, so they are NOT from the original Autodesk content center, and therefore they are equivalent to your "Executive Tables".

I have forced a change in the content center table (making an almost invisible change to the M2,5x8 screw) and then I have loaded an assembly in Inventor containing that screw. If you click on the "Standard Component Refresh" button (red circle) Inventor will detect that something has changed and will offer you to update it. If you have massive changes on standard parts, the best strategy to follow is exactly what Mike has suggested, doing it from the Task Scheduler.

Be aware that, if you have a PDM in use, there are some details to keep in mind, as the PDM system could take over the control of standard parts.

...I was hoping to give you a solution (you know, my Autodesk mentor told me that I need "solutions") but Mike was faster while I was sleeping 🤣.

Honor to the winner!! 💪

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the answers, unfortunate I'm a very inexperienced user.

I tried to do the following things import a content part as Custom into a assembly.

I made a few changes to it and tried to press Refresh but I get the message 'No standard components exist in this assembly'.

Then I tried the Task Sheduler program with the following task 'update design' and selected the new drawing.

The status indicates its completed but I didn't see any changes..

I'm really sorry to bother with you, maybe if I wasn't so inexperienced I coulda handled it myself:(

[freesbee]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

I tried to do the following things import a content part as Custom into a assembly.

I made a few changes to it and tried to press Refresh but I get the message 'No standard components exist in this assembly'.

(for the moment the Task Scheduler step is not relevant)

Please explain me what do you mean by "I made a few changes"

[Anonymous]

The old design of our 'Executive' has 2 solids on top of each other.

We adjusted the model in reality that the 2 solids are connected in miter (45° degrees). 

Thats the only adjustment I made in the old drawing.

[Frederick_Law]

Attach some screen shot.

Also, a "drawing" is 2D.

A "model" is 3D.

I believe you edit a "model".

Another, also.

Is the "model" a part or assembly?

Or a multi-body part?

Did you went through tutorial in the software and get some basic idea of how it work?

[CGBenner]

@Anonymous 

Hi,

Once you place a component from your Content Center library "As Custom", it is no longer considered "Standard".  At this point it becomes a standalone part.  If you want to make change that can be pushed back to the Content Family, you first need to make that Family a custom family. 

So... to begin with, do you have a custom Read/Write library in your Content Center?

[freesbee]

Ok, now it's easier to follow you.

Content Center files are generated on the hard drive where the content center family tells to. Those parts are REAL content center, and editing options can follow ONLY 2 strategies. If you "save as custom" you generate a new geometry based on the content center, and you are free to edit this new geometry the way you want. I will name this second one a "less REAL" content center part.

How to change REAL Content Center parts

We have 2 strategies at our disposal.

1. change one or more table values in the family table. This will affect only members that are using this parameters. If you change the value of your member "Executive 120cm QR", when you load an assembly containing THAT specific executive and do the workflow I have suggested a couple of posts ago, you will see what I have described (for example if you change a value to 121 cm)

2. replace the family template. This will affect all members of your family, as normally it is not a parameter

Be aware that this applies in a first instance to those parts which are REAL Content Center parts

Now how to get the "family template"? This can be obtained exactly with "save as custom". Once a specific geometry is saved as custom it can be used as family template for propagating the change to your entire family. So once you have done all your changes, you can right click the family, chose "replace family template", pick the file that you have just edited, and the changes you have done to that file will propagate to all members.

How to change "less REAL" Content Center parts

In case of parts that have been "saved as custom", changes to the family table will still affect the corresponding parameters that are linked in the part. Depending on what you want to obtain you need to consider how to edit that "saved as custom part" (changing geometries, un-linking parameters...), but I suspect that this situation is still quite far away from yours.

I still do not know enough of your specific system, but I suspect that this is what you need  is to "replace the family template". Be aware of what you are doing, contact me if you feel uncomfortable by doing it 😉