Adding constraints using ilogic

[lee_gardnerXXNJE]

Hi All,

 I have an issue that I'm hopeful you all can help with. I will start by saying that I'm fairly new to iLogic, (Inventor user for almost 20 years, iLogic about 3 months)

I am trying to resolve an ilogic issue I currently have. 

My models are set up as master models and get copy designed regularly and the first part of the part number always changes. This hasn't been a problem up to now. The way the iLogic is set up I use the code below:

oDoc = ThisDoc.FileName(False)
oVin = Left(oDoc, InStr(oDoc, "-") -1)

Then I apply oVin as my changeable part number so when I want to pass parameters down from an assembly to part parameters I use  

Parameter(oVin & "-123456:1", "HEIGHT") = MASTER_HEIGHT

This works really well.

The problem I have is when I want to add components and add constraints, For example, at the top assembly level I use ilogic to add a boss and I want to apply a constraint between its X Axis and a know axis in one of the other parts. Inventor doesn't like the oVin term

Constraints.AddMate("Mate1", "BOSS:1", "X Axis", oVin & "-Manifold_Block", "BOSS AXIS",

This is the error I get

Unable to cast object of type 'System.String' to type 'Autodesk.iLogic.Types.ComponentArgument'.

Any help would be appreciated 

[Curtis_Waguespack]

Hi @lee_gardnerXXNJE ,

Welcome to the forum. I think you will want to do something like this.

Hope that helps,

Curtis

Dim oComponent = Component.InventorComponent(oVin & "-Manifold_Block")

Constraints.AddMate("Mate1", "BOSS:1", "X Axis", oComponent.Name, "BOSS AXIS")

[lee_gardnerXXNJE]

Hi @Curtis_Waguespack ,

 Thanks, I tried that and the error i get is that it cant find the part with the oVin number. But the error has the correct part number and the part is in the model so thats both positive.

Sorry, i havent used Dim ocomponent previously, do i rename ocomponent and ocomponent.name in the code to a name? Im trying to understand what its doing, is it assigning the oVin part number to a single string?

[Curtis_Waguespack · Accepted solution]

Hi @lee_gardnerXXNJE , no need to apologize. See if this clears anything up. I might be overexplaining some of it, but I wasn't sure where the error is coming from.

Post back if you have more questions.

hope that helps,

Curtis

Dim oComponent = Component.InventorComponent(oVin & "-Manifold_Block")

The line above is just getting the component occurrence from the assembly and assigning it to a variable called oComponent.

So if we had this as the assembly:

... oComponent would be getting the component named 1234-Manifold_Block 

The next line then uses that variable with the .name property, so that we get the name string from the component to use in the constraint add line.

Constraints.AddMate("Mate1", "BOSS:1", "X Axis", oComponent.Name, "BOSS AXIS")

Here it is in use, in a simple example assembly where oVin is just being hardcoded for simplicity sake.

[lee_gardnerXXNJE]

Thanks @Curtis_Waguespack,

 That worked perfectly, I will be using that in alot of places now

[lee_gardnerXXNJE]

Hi @Curtis_Waguespack ,

 Sorry 1 more question, What if the part I am trying to constrain to is multiple levels deep? So to follow on our example above the manifold block is sitting in a sub assembly, 1 or 2 levels deep

[Curtis_Waguespack]

Hi @lee_gardnerXXNJE ,

see the info below.

Hope that helps, Curtis

You could do it something like this, where the curly brackets are used to denote the array path to the component:

oVin = "1234"
oComponentName =  oVin & "-Manifold_Block"
Constraints.AddMate("Mate:7", "Block99", "BottomFace", {"Front Assembly", oComponentName}, "FrontFace")

Where this is the assembly:

Note that to get the syntax, you can find the constraint in the iLogic editor as shown, and right click and choose Capture Current State ( Constraints.Add)

Then it's just a matter of modifying the resulting line to plug in the assembled component name using oVin, etc.

[lee_gardnerXXNJE]

Hi @Curtis_Waguespack 

Thanks i will try that shortly, and...OMG that Capture thing has just blown my mind. Looking forward to trying that