Any tool and die people here?

[DieMan44]

I check this board every now and again for information. This is the most helpful site I've seen including the UGS new group, even though John Baker is on both. Anyhow, since I work for a stamper/die shop most of my work consists of designing dies and check fixture. I've seen posts every once in a while by someone asking questions relating to our field. I was wondering how many there are here and how they go about using UG for their designs, ie assemblies, die wizzard, other apps. There just doesn't seem to be much out there relating to tool and die, and support for the progressive die wizzard seems non-existant.

 

[hudson888]

Too wide for me to respond to. I think the idea of a Wizard is that if it works then it shouldn't need too much support.

You could try asking something more specific I know there are some Mold Wizard posts from time to time maybe you'll get lucky!

Cheers

Hudson

 

[NXMold]

Injection mold designer here.

NX 5.0.3.2 MoldWizard

 

[hegdedin]

I am also Injection mold designer

NX 4 Mold wizard

 

[smitty239]

Tool and Die here, anything from small prog dies to full auto transfers, dies from 2 feet long to 20' long. I run a basic UG setup (couldn't afford anything else) assemblies / drafting and a grip execute. I we learned everything the hard way trial and error. Ug support was very vague on how the best way was to do everything design / update/ BOM etc. they had many suggestions on how to many individual things but could not / would not help with a whole soloution. I don't blame them it took us (the place I was at) 4 years to get a solid working process for the whole thing that we were happy with.

Smitty

http://www.changes-consulting.com

 

[DieMan44]

Smitty,

We are doing the same thing except we are still working on being satisfied with our process. There are only 2 of us in this department with only around 4 years experence. We did get the Progressive Die Wizard but have found it very hard to use, not many standard items like cylinders, cams, etc. I guess you can get Anchor Danly and other vendor templetes for the PDW for a fee or a 3rd party add-on. But we still found it sorely lacking and support non existant. We are going to take a second look at at when we migrate to NX5 (G.M. supplyer requirements). But most likely we won't use it and will be looking for suggestions and design processes from other experienced die designers. I still don't understand how to use the BOM on a drawing or that auto ballon.

 

[smitty239]

I have heard the prog die wizard is greatly improved in NX5, I really don't like it's file structure or naming conventions I would bet they didn't have a real die guy on the team designing the wizard. I do believe for very difficult parts the prog die wizard is still not up to the challenge. I personally have not used the auto ballooning since it first came out because when I deleted a balloon it deleted the items from my BOM. I don't kinow if this has ever been fixed. The BOM inside basic UG is not fully automatic it is based upon part attributes that you the user must enter many people use grip programs or now days visual basic or C programs to extract part sizes to help automate this chore. If there is anything else I can help with I will try

Smitty

http://www.changes-consulting.com

 

[uwam2ie]

I'm not familar on the wizards a little in the diedesign /planning.(NX3-NX5- V5) I like the approaches in Nx6. The design in context enhancements are really cool, the selection and full screen.

 

[NXMold]

I went through the auto-BOM process as completely as possible, had it just about working, then realized its pretty much useless. Its much quicker and easier to do it manually in excel, then import as a note. When creating the bom I read attributes (manually) from stanard parts.

If you want to try the auto stuff yourself, here are some of my notes:

-------------------------

Make the component the displayed part before editing attributes, editing at assembly level has a different effect (can be seen by the icon next to the parameter name).

Component attributes: DESCRIPTION, SUPPLIER, CATALOG

Attributes to hide items from stock list:
PLIST_IGNORE_MEMBER (hides component only, sub-components still visible)
PLIST_IGNORE_SUBASSEMBLY (hides component and all sub-components)

-------------------------

Place "parts list" on drawing, select a column, insert additional columns. Select the new column, right click Style, set attribute name under columns tab [CATALOG, SUPPLIER, etc]

Select parts list and update, then sort.

-------------------------


NX 5.0.3.2 MoldWizard

 

[NXMold]

"I think the idea of a Wizard is that if it works then it shouldn't need too much support."

Having used NX5 for less than a year (no prior unigraphics expierience), I found moldwizard to be a horrible pain to learn. I'm still learning every day. The whole wizard is a different style from native NX, and many of the dialogs are terribly difficult to understand (such as buttons without labels!).

I think everything relating to the parting part is a catastrophe, it is especially difficult to tweak the parting line or mold csys.

Documentation is quite poor. I agree that many specific detailed steps are shown well enough, but the how/why overview and best practice is missing.



NX 5.0.3.2 MoldWizard

 

[cowski]

Its much quicker and easier to do it manually in excel, then import as a note.

This may be true in your case, but in general the parts list (auto BOM as you say) is preferred because it is associated to what is actually in the assembly and will update along with assembly changes. An imported note can get out of synch pretty quickly.

That's not to say that your method is 'wrong' or even 'bad', if it works for you - great that's one more way to skin your cat.

 

[NXMold]

True, but since coming aboard with NX I've pulled back a bit on all the associativity. With mold designs, everything is a one-off custom. Once the design is done, the types of changes made do not benefit from associative models, parts lists, etc. Using associative tecniques is benefical during the initial design process, but only to a certain extent.

For example, mating screws to the planar face of a plate will keep them updated if the thickness changes, but the [significant] time spent mating would allow manual repositioning a couple times. The plate thickness is not likely to change, certainly not many times. To be efficient then, you have to skip mating. This is completely reversed if designing a library moldbase which will be used again and again.

Anyway, I'm beating a long dead horse and we probably agree it's nice to have options.

NX 5.0.3.2 MoldWizard

 

[jonasr]

Sorry for I am a partially OFF, but I do not find topic of my questoion...
The moldwizard will be updated or the v3 is the latest version? Any function/commands are unparametrized/non-associative and the mold modification is big problem for me. e.g I use the parting manager, and I create parting segments, but the product data is changed, these non-associative elements are not follow the modifications.

I am also Injection mold designer

regards,
jr from HU

 

[NXMold]

What do you mean V3? Everyting is associative in NX5, I regularly (at least once per design) swap out product models.

Moldwizard has been updated in NX6 to follow the newer style dialogs and add some new functionality, looks promising. I'm upgrading in the next week or so.

NX 5.0.3.2 MoldWizard

 

[ewh]

I have to disagree with regard to mating components taking "significant" effort. I have found the new constraints to be much more user friendly than the old mating. I do get frustrated sometimes when a constraint won't apply due to some unrelated constraint preventing it, but it has saved my butt on more than one occasion when a designer models mating holes slightly off between components. This is the type of mistake that you wouldn't discover if you only use reposition, and I use it as a design check as well as for its original purpose.
You could make the same claim about much of the software taking "significant" effort - at least until you get enough experience to use it efficiently.

When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty. - [small]Thomas Jefferson [/small]

 

[design0058]

We have been using the progressive die wizard for about 3 years and we are still learning. We had one designer work on customizing it and adding our standards for about 6 months before we started to use it for our progressive die designs. If you are looking for help I suggest you contact Jason Decker at NX. I had him for training on the progressive die wizard and he wrote one of the training books. He has experience in die and mold design. He can talk your lingo.
On another matter, I’ve been using UG since version 6 or so. Sometimes I wonder if these software designers ever turned a wrench in their life or had a deadline and budget to get a job done. It seems like with every new version of NX it takes me a little bit longer to do my job. Take away a button push here and 2 mouse picks there if you know what I mean. Well, now that I’ve gotten that off of my chest – good luck.

 

[NXMold]

ewh, its all about your method as a whole. Certianly, if you draw a hole in one part, mate a faster to it, then link that faster geometry into another part... everything must be tidy or the final assembly may not go together.

I use fastners which contains a false body, then link that body into each component to makes the holes. Therefore, no misalignment is between components is possible. The fastner could end up in a relative unwanted position (off center, etc) but as each component is custom made to my geometry, that mistake wont prevent things from going together.

Remember, we work on Very different kinds of projects!

NX 5.0.3.2 MoldWizard