Replace drawing template

[spl1970]

Hi All,

I've made some changes to my drawing template and I'd like these changes to be reflected in a drawing that I created before the changes. I don't really want to recreate the whole drawing. Is it possible to replace just the template? So the title block information etc in effect.

Many thanks,

Simon

[Cadmanto]

The easiest way to do it is to open the new template, open your old drawing.  In your old drawing, delete the title block or border, which ever one was updated.  Then in the template, in the browser under the title blocks folder (or which ever one you again updated) RC on the TB, and select copy.  Then in the old drawing, find again in the browser the same comparable one, RC and select replace.  Then push it down  into your drawing.

Windows 10 x64 -16GB Ram
Intel i7-6700 @ 3.41ghz
nVidia GTS 250 - 1 GB
Inventor Pro 2018

[mcgyvr · Accepted solution]

There is also the Drawing Resource Transfer Wizard utility that can batch process titleblock changed to multiple drawings..

[spl1970]

Perfect. Thanks for your help.

[j.reina]

This works for Title Block updates, but can the entire template be replaced with a newer one?  My new template has "Custom Properties".  I want to copy to either replace the entire template or copy and paste the custom properties from the updated template to older drawings.

[SBix26]

There is no such thing as "replacing the template" of an existing file.  A new Inventor file is essentially just a copy of the template that existed at the moment when it was created, and has no link or connection to the template from which it was created.

One tool that might be useful (or might not) is Design Assistant.  DA includes a tool called Copy Design Properties.

You can start DA by right clicking on the source file (the drawing template, in your case) in Windows File Explorer and selecting Design Assistant.  In the DA window, under the Tools menu, select Copy Design Properties.  This allows you to select which iProperties you wish to copy, and then select the files to which you want to copy them.

However... this applet is very old.  The GUI has not been updated in the twenty years that I've been using Inventor, and lacks even the most basic controls such as resizing(!).  You can't filter by file type, and the choices of files to present for selection is limited to Related Files, Current Folder, or SubFolders.  Pretty clunky.  But, it works.

Best strategy for using this tool would be to have all the target files in one folder.

Hopefully, someone else has a better idea.

---

Sam B

Inventor Pro 2023.1 | Windows 10 Home 21H2