Using Content Center for parts that need a drawing?

[Perry_deKruijk]

Hello everyone,

I was thinking about publishing some standard parts in the Content Center. 

For example standard shafts, or a simple sheetmetal part with two holes etc.

But for our production proces we are still in need of a 2d drawing. (I can not change this...)

In that case, is it still a good idea to use Content Center?

The reason why I am thinking about Content Center is because I want to be able to change part sizes easily in the assembly environment (like bolts), and also re-use existing parts.

We have an engineering department with around 15 engineers with all different Inventor skill levels. So when using ContentCenter brings some complicated procedures with it, then it is not the way to go...

Searching in Vault for existing parts is also een option, but when it is easier to do a 'save copy as' and change sizes you know what most engineers do... 

Any thoughts about this..?

"standard" parts:

PdK

 

[johnsonshiue]

Hi! I believe it is doable and we do have quite a few customers leveraging this workflow. The power of Content Center is to build a custom library of parts. These parts are mainly for reuse purposes. If they are one-off, there is no point publishing to CC.

Creating drawings for CC parts is just like any regular part. The only limitation is that CC part does not support Model States. You may publish a part with non-Primary Model States. But CC cannot help manage the Model States. Nor can you designate which Model State to be active on placement.

Many thanks!

[pcrawley]

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Any thoughts about this..?

Here are mine: 

Standard components that are placed, then saved under a new name and modified are no longer standard; they're custom parts. I think the only defence for that behaviour is that it gives you something to work from rather than drawing something from scratch. If you look at the whole lifecycle of whatever you design - 3d design, 2d drawing, manufacturing, procurement, installation, maintenance, spares... having 'custom' components is expensive. It's expensive to design, draw, maintain, replace etc. If you can keep "standard" parts as standard - do the drawings for the size variants - you never have to draw those components again, and everyone downstream will recognise and be able to maintain standard components.

I've seen many designers inserting a 'standard' component into a design and then drawing it as part of the overall design. The result is hundreds of drawings of the same component... madness! (Not to mention costly and confusing). A search of one customer's network returned thousands of duplicate models of handles, fasteners, wheels, and bearings - all 'standard' components of which there should only have been one file of each. And then each instance had its own drawing. I started calculating the approximate cost of all this extra work, but the numbers were frightening!

If your designs are made up of lots of standard components, the only drawings you'll ever need are assembly instructions and a component list - all the component drawings have already been done - and that quickly becomes a huge time saver. You might think restricting a designer's freedom to pick anything from a supplier's catalogue is unhelpful. However, the result will benefit everyone if your Content Center has pre-drawn "ready to go" parts you know you can buy or make.

Note regarding Vault:  Vault's search tools are sooooo much better than Windows File Explorer, and Vault Professional even supports "duplicate searches". See Vault 2022 Help | Duplicate Search | Autodesk.

[Perry_deKruijk]

Thanks for your answers.

Standard components that are placed, then saved under a new name and modified are no longer standard; they're custom parts. I think the only defence for that behaviour is that it gives you something to work from rather than drawing something from scratch. If you look at the whole lifecycle of whatever you design - 3d design, 2d drawing, manufacturing, procurement, installation, maintenance, spares... having 'custom' components is expensive. It's expensive to design, draw, maintain, replace etc. If you can keep "standard" parts as standard - do the drawings for the size variants - you never have to draw those components again, and everyone downstream will recognise and be able to maintain standard components.

This is exactly the case. Those parts will not be standard, but they are size variants. So for example the shaft I mentioned in the first post will have basicly three parameters; diameter, length, hole size and maybe material. 

And when I do a duplicate search in Vault I can assure you I find a lot of shafts with diameter 30, length 500 and M8 holes... And next year it will be even a couple more.. Of course I would like to stop this madness..! 

But my question is, can Content Center be of use for these kind of size variant parts with drawings?  (Or is CC really only ment for real standard parts like bolts and bearings, which dont need drawings) Maybe Inventor has already a better way of coping with these kind of size variant parts. (I have not yet dived in to the world of I-parts, maybe my answer lies there...)

We work with Vaul Proffesional and I have looked at the option of searching for size variants. But searching in Vault is nog that 123 easy for everyone, not to mention that there is a ton of difference in the quality of drawings that come with the part.. 

So I would really like to start on a clean slade when it comes to these parts. 

PS

Our company has some experience is size variant parts in Content Center. Spacers/bushings are available as content center part, but the number of different sized parts are pre defined and limited to maybe 100 parts or something. But with shafts with three different parameters (diameter, holessize and specially length) Im looking at potentially thousands of size variants. 

[A.Acheson]

Hi @Perry_deKruijk 

It sounds like to me you have a situation where the shafts are actually standard but you have not compiled the full list as it is continuously growing. CC would be a good place to do this work but it will need to be updated by a user with privileges. 

Making them custom as previously mentioned would be the wrong approach. 

iParts/model states are also other valid ways to make this a configurable part. I do like CC for this layout where the part isn't too complex and it can be easily accessed with a convenient dialog box. iParts and model states don't have this which really kills the productivity I feel.. 

At the end of the day a designer still needs to update the configuration table wherever it is in a consistent manner. Having a consistent/easy naming convention  will make short work of what are seemingly custom but develop into standard sizes over time. This is where good training and standard procedures comes in. 

One method would be to defined what configurations are available example a whole size with offset in 2mm increments. Start narrowing down the choices. If it is outside the parameters then make a custom part but a design review should flag its custom and cross check it needs to be. 

The next question would be how to know if the part has a drawing associated. Having the same part number/ filename would be one way. If you have vault there is likely an easy way to look this up.

If your trying to clean up legacy files then you could also use ilogic/vba code to check parameters of the model and flag any that have been duplicated parameters and filenames. This will catch the same model configuration but different filename.

[Perry_deKruijk]

Thank you all for thinking with me. 

As I am reading your comments I'm concluding that I have to dig deeper in the possibilities Inventor and Vault have for "standard" parts. The most important for me is that the workflow is 'simple and steady', I choose a fex extra clicks for a simple workflow over a 'lean' approach that crashes ones in a while. 

My experiences with Content Center parts have not always been positive. Could be the way we (wronly) use it, or just Inventor that has its flaws... 

For now thanks for your input! 

[ampster40]

For the most part using CC files hasn't been a problem as long as everything is configured correctly.

I just wanted to mention we use CC in a manner where if we know no prior modifications need to be done to a tube for example, we insert a CC part as a standard part and no drawing will be generated because it will appear in the BOM as raw material.  If we have to add holes or machining operations to it, we insert from the CC but mark it as a custom file.  At that point it is left up to a person to have to generate a drawing file as there is no method to automatically create an idw from a custom CC part.

So we use it for both, Standard and Custom parts and it works for us.  

HTH

[Perry_deKruijk]

Sounds interesting. 

(We need a drawing for every part we produce, but thats another story. )

But the way you use it, for instance for tubes. They can have length sizes between, lets say, 10mm and 6000mm. 

Does the table behind the CC part have all the possible lengths..? 

(Maybe I have to dive into the textbook knowledge about Content Center first, but asking you anyway 😉 

[ampster40]

Our CC library has been setup so that we can use any length possible between 0" and 288" which is the maximum length we can obtain without having to splice tubes together.  Some items were set previously to their max available size but due to how those items are glued onto the machines, we've eliminated the max length option and instead enter total length and let manf. chop up parts as needed.  This way they can use up drop or excess stock as needed.  I am not aware how this is done today but we are able to enter what ever length tube we need.  In the past it was limited to lengths of 1/8" increment which is a limit in itself if you need something in between.  Ignore I mentioned imperial because it all works too with metric obviously heh.

[dave.cutting]

Hi,

If you set the length of the tube as an expression, you can set the max. & min. and default length, along with the increments for the cut.