Reference parts not visible when the assembly is inserted as sub assembly

[sergio.missori]

Reference parts are great way to model your sub assembly being able to see the context where it lives. Then when you insert your group in the whole machine you no longher need these references.

It woluld be great to have, at least as an option, the possibility to have references hidden or suppressed by default. This will help in keeping big ena complex assemblies light and fast in memory.

Actually we are doing it with LOD or view representation but the designer of the group need to specify reference parts and create the LOD "NoReference". The automatic way is faster.

[PaulMunford]

Please can you clarify. What do you mean by 'References'?

[sergio.missori]

Hello PaulMunford,

"Reference" is an attribute of the Structure of bills of materials.

Fome the BOM you can set many attributes like Normal, Purchased, Phantom and Reference. From the context menu of Inventor Browser you have a shortcut to set a part as Reference or Normal.

Reference components have the following characteristics:

• They are ignored in the BOM.
• They are excluded from the mass calculations.
• They are not numbered, and are not directly included in quantity calculations.
• Child components of the reference component are ignored in the BOM.
• They are shown with a hidden line style in drawing views.

The behavior I was proposing has been reported from one of my designer that was using Solid Edge before and appreciated this kind of management of references across the hyerarchy.

[shawn.payne]

If you are finished with them can you just delete them? Just curious.

[sergio.missori]

No, I don't want to delete reference parts because they are used to make more clear the layout view in the drawing.

Our machines are subdivided in groups and sub-groups. Usually one group is something that can be pre-assembled but sometimes it is split in sub groups that stay together when assembled on other parts. Here comes the need to have these parts in the group as reference but when I asseble it on the machine I don't need to see them.

[shawn.payne]

You can create a simplified part for the assembly. That way your parts will still be in your main assembly and you can place the simplified part with the extra details turned off in your assembly. 

[sergio.missori]

Of course, this is just what we are doing.

This workflow requires that the designer creates a simplified reperesentation, he is aware about it so he uses when he load in the assembly and he keeps it up to date. Whe have over 20 designers, the one who models the sub assembly may be not the same it will use in the main assembly. So we have to add a rule on who and when must add the simplification.

This is Designer Aided Computer , not CAD.