Design table generated assembly does not stick to its table parameters inside another assembly

I am modeling a line of furniture that has a great amount of
resemblance between different pieces, like a desk, file storage
cabinet, credenza, etc. I have used a design table to define major
dimensions of a drawer "carcass", i.e. height, width, depth, which is
linked to design sketches within the assembly. These design sketches
define the major dimension of an assembly envelope, and then
individual parts are mated to the surfaces of the envelope. I create
different configurations within the design table for the different
pieces of furniture.

This scheme works fine within the drawer carcass assembly, so I tried
to do the same thing with a drawer assembly. I have about 2-3
different drawer sizes to use within a single assembly; for example a
credenza might have a shallow drawer on top and then two deeper
drawers below it. I have created an assembly with different
configurations (as described above) for different drawer sizes.

The problem is, when I bring the drawer sub-assembly into the drawer
carcass assembly, it will only show the "last used" configuration of
the drawer sub-assembly, regardless of which configuration is selected
under the properties for that sub-assembly. So if I try to mix drawer
sizes within a single configuration, it doesn't work.

Am I missing something? Am I not able to use different
design-table-generated configurations for a sub-assembly within the
same assembly file? If not, how would I go about achieving the same
goal without creating separate configurations of each individual part
within a drawer assembly?

Dylan

 

(Dylan) wrote in @posting.google.com:

If I understand the issue correctly, the problem is that you are making
incontext parts with your assembly configurations. It sounds like there is
only one configuration of the drawer parts, so that is the only one that
can be shown, even if you have multiple assy configs.

There are a couple ways around this.

1) SW claims to have solved this problem in the last release or so, but
the solution is kinda weak. You can configure sketch relationships. So,
for each part config (yes, you have to make part configs to go with the
assy configs), you can turn on or off in context sketch relationships. To
me, this seems like a lot of work or clumsy.

2) Build the parts as multibodies in a single part where you don't get the
in context limitations, make part configs which size the drawer, then use
the split command to save the bodies out as separate parts referring to the
original part. This sounds kind of cumbersome too, but it works well.
I've used the scheme on a couple of consumer products, and I prefer it to
other methods. I have a small example on my website using a hinge -
www.frontiernet.net/~mlombard , go to the swparts link and scroll down.

matt

 

Matt is correct although trying to do (Matt's 2) multibodies in things like
sheetmetal I don't think is possible.

Maybe another alternative is to use SW Explorer and "copy" (with prefix or
suffix) both the assem and the "children" parts. You end up with multiple
files which are bad but you can now have these 2 independent sub-assembles
in the same assembly.

I tried this with a forming roll design once. It worked, but I found it too
messy to be practical. I haven't tried the on/off context sketch which maybe
easier.

 

Yes... I was only able to get "top level" assemblies to generate and
stick-to their table parameters, so having two instances of the same
assembly with two different table-generated configurations did not
work. So parts that are defined by the dimension of a sub-assembly's
envelope, for example, will not display differently within the same
assembly.

I was forced to make multiple configurations of each individual part.
That seems like a bit of a pain; though I can see that down the road
when I'm creating the drawings, having one size for one part
configuration will make generation of the shop drawings much simpler.

Not sure if there is a better way to do this?

- Dylan