Custom iProperties - Instance Level

[cbenner]

I would like to see the ability to create a custom iProperty which can have a unique value for each instance of the part placed in an assembly.  This would give users the ability to add things like tag numbers to parts.  Example, valves and instruments in a piping assembly which can have the P&ID tag number on them, or terminals in an electrical control cabinet which can be sequentially numbered even though they are the same Inventor part model.

There is currently no method for doing this in Inventor.  In this image, all of these terminals are the same part, but each needs a unique tag number in the drawing.  I had to rebuild this in AutoCAD Electrical, a total of about 6 hours labor to produce this twice.

@dan_szymanski

[ermolov-s]

In the assembly of electrical components tags are only displayed on the right.

In EPLAN ProPanel have the opportunity to enable the display of the tags for each component in the assembly and in the drawing. This is great for quick determination of the position of electric components in the assembly and in the drawing.

It would be nice to be able to see the tag for each part of the electrical circuit in the assembly and in the drawing. It would have increased the efficiency of collaboration Inventor and AutoCAD Electrical.

[ermolov-s]

In this forum, there are those who understand the interaction of AutoCAD Electrical and Inventor? Or is developing the design and construction of cabinets only in AutoCAD Electrical?

Someone develops electrical cabinets in Inventor? Do you like everything in Inventor?

[vikas.vaishnav]

This makes the idea more clearer to me. Thanks for explanation. I too am curious to know the answer of your above comment from this forum. 

Regards,

AutoCAD Electrical Team.

[omartin]

The ability to create custom properties at the assembly level that are assigned to a part, but are not pushed to the part as an iProperty.

so you can have the same part in multiple assemblies, but each assembly can assign it a value.

which can be mapped or used in dwgs / textboxes / vault / balloons etc...

Like the item number property in an assembly, is unique for the assembly.

Best regards

[DRoam]

Interesting idea. It would basically be "Occurrence" iProperties. I think @PaulMunford mentioned wanting this somewhere but I can't find where.

Could you explain a little more about your workflow for this? For example...

1. Are these Parts in a library location and used across multiple Projects? Or are they usually stored as a unique copy in each Project that uses them?
2. When you use these Parts in an assembly, do you always only place one instance of them in the Assembly? Or do you sometimes place more than once instance? In other words, do multiple instances need to share the same assembly-level iProperties?

[PaulMunford]

That's right.

For example - Revit has 'Instance' properties (The Inventor equivalent of Instance is Occurrence).

So In Revit, you can have a family (the definition) placed in to the project multiple times (Instances).

The definition contains parameters which are common to all instances. The instance contains parameters which are unique to that instance.

So we could design a door and frame in Revit that has common (definition) properties such as material and hardware, and instance properties such as the door number - which is unique to that door.

Does that make sense?

[omartin]

@DRoam 

We create dwgs to tag certain components, some components are library parts but it is possible to have regular parts as well.

ex: Sensor identification list: we can have the same sensor which is used in different parts of a machine and each sensor would require a different tag

I think the best way is to be able to assign each occurrence properties and then have a roll-up option.

Paul also has a good point of having the ability to have common properties as well as unique properties for an instance.

Right now we just manually tag each item and then override it, it would be nice to create a balloon style that would point to this custom property.

Another loop is some times the part I want to tag is not in the immediate BOM structure but couple of levels deep. and can be a part or an assembly.

So in addition to the BOM Browser, you may need another list type manager, where you define a list and then pick the occurrence first and add the properties and build up a list of components manually. so we can have multiple list in one assembly.

So then we can create a balloon style that has the ability to be pointed to these custom lists.

[PaulMunford]

Revit also has a nice feature, whereby you can 'Tag' items and schedule the tags.

My understanding is that the tags have their own item number, but they can pick up data from the model that they are connected to.

So, something like a Balloon, Leader Annotation or Sketched Symbol In Inventor, but with the additional ability to hold their own ID number.

I think that the purpose of this is to allow different people to Tag items for different reasons, without having to go into the models and add lots of information that may not be required on future projects. 

For instance, the designer can tag with a WIP part number, the estimator can tag with a cost estimate ID, the Project manager can Tag by work package and so on.

We can't do this directly in Inventor. The only way I can think of (currently) to do anything like would be to wrap a part inside a phantom assembly so that we can add additional data to the phantom sub-assembly, and call that back in an annotation...

[AlexFielder]

On the surface what you're asking for sounds feasible, but on reflection it would require a fundamental change to the way Inventor and iProperties work.

IF I understand iProperties (at the API-level) correctly, they are simply a non-editable* collection of attributes that Inventor exposes to the user for capturing file-specific information.

What you're asking for is (and correct me if I'm wrong) an extension of this to include instance-specific values for tagging. It's actually possible if you place an attribute collection in the top-level assembly which ties values to specific instance names. Adding those is (relatively) trivial, but I'm assuming you would want to access them later on at the drawing/BOM levels? Which isn't impossible, but not an overnight fix.

Beyond that, another/simpler way to achieve the same goal is to create the terminals (or whatever) as an iPart with a new row for each tag. That would at least generate a new part file which can then have its own TAG for later reference.

*Non-editable because there is no way of affecting the default property names for things like Part Number, Description etc.

[Curtis_Waguespack]

related ideas:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/multiple-item-numbers-for-similar-parts-in-inventor-pa...

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/unique-piping-parts-parts-list/idi-p/5938699

[Anonymous]

I think I know what you mean. Below I'm sending you the link from our Polish master of Inventor. He puts tag numbers on the same part.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yxVJWK9V4gw

See the video and let us know if it was helpful.

[DRoam]

We already have instance-level control over one iProperty (sort of)...: BOM structure.

This is exactly what is needed for iProperties. An override of the default value that only affects specific instances.

One thing I'm wondering is about the BOM. Should these over-ridden instances show up as a unique row on the BOM? I would imagine in some cases you'd want that and in others you wouldn't. And even if you don't want those unique instances showing up in the BOM/Parts List, might you want to at least be able to manage them from the BOM?

[cbenner]

Since posting this, I've been getting a lot of ideas and feedback.  The most interesting is one I was unaware of, the fact that in Inventor Cable & Harness, there are already reference designators that can be used to put a property on an occurrence of a C&H component or wire or whatever (never touched C&H so I don't know the terminology).  So, it sounds like the technology is there, right in front of us. If this could be modified so that it could be used across Inventor (maybe with the help of Vault?), then that would be exactly what I am looking for.  I'm going to tag @dan_szymanski again.... sorry Dan!

[dan_szymanski]

Hi Chris @cbenner, please never apologize for attempting to make Inventor better.  : )  We are all trying to do our part in improving workflows and eliminate work-arounds.  We will look into it.  Cheers -Dan

[freesbee]

The implementation of this idea would also solve an industry requirement in the "process industry" business, commonly known as Nozzle List ("Stutzentabelle" in the German market, where they are quite proficient with process industry). At the current stage this can be done only manually, with an incredibly high amount of effort and error probability on more complex systems.

Whoever would like to receive more information on the topic can contact me directly.

[cbenner]

Discussions I had at AU2017 have made it clearer to me that this is, in fact, a desired and do-able function.  I presented the idea as related to an electrical cabinet.  This was the example in front of me at the time I posted it.  I am not currently running the electro-mechanical relationship to AutoCad Electrical but may one day.  This idea, however, has implications outside of electrical cabinets.  One of our largest uses of it would be for P&ID tags assigned to individual components in our piping assemblies.  I heard other uses at AU.

I am told this is only a "medium" t-shirt size for the Inventor development team.  With enough votes this can be done, so let's show the true power of community!  Thank you all!

[dan_szymanski]

Idea added to backlog for future consideration [11680]. Thanks!

[K_Baker_89]

I'm keen to be able to reference Asset Tag, or another property allowing each element to be identified, using balloons on a drawing.

I don't want several identical parts, which just have unique element numbers, to be listed as separate parts. I simply want to be able to identify each element on a drawing with a unique identifier to aid assembly on site. This identifier would need to be defined at the Assy/Factory level, leading me to believe that "Asset Tag" would be ideal.

Thanks,

Kurt

[jingyi.liu]

Hi Kurt

Thanks for your feedback, we have received similar request from FDU customer and Inventor users, please refer to below idea posted by Chris Benner, and also read Curtis's comments.

Your idea includes all of below request. To achieve the goal, Inventor need to support occurrence level iProperty (tag) definition, then it can be consumed by drawing balloons. So, I will merge your idea with the first one for future tracking. 

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/custom-iproperties-instance-level/idi-p/7466909

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/multiple-item-numbers-for-similar-parts-in-inventor-pa... 

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/unique-piping-parts-parts-list/idi-p/5938699

Thanks,

Jingyi

[DJFore]

This is a topic that we have tried to solve internally for years I agree tagging equipment with a property that is accessible on drawings is very needed. I did not see above but it also should be able to be pushed through to BIM applications through such as Navisworks work flow etc... My customers are requesting itemized tagging and another like benefit might be piping end connection identification.