Arrangements and Deformable Parts (NX 4)? 2

[lorenolepi]

I've been using arrangements with deformable springs. The only thing that is deformable about the spring is the length. When the components move I want the spring to compress.... The only thing that I have found to work is to add multiple deform springs and suppress them within the different arrangments so that only one is showing up at a time (1 spring per arrangement). This becomes a timlely process and can get confusing fast. I tried using a measurement expression but it wouldn't update unless I actually clicked on the measuement expression within the Part Navigator and it came up with a msg that it had changed and then it would update. Is there anything I could do to make it work with only 1 deformable spring and have the deform expression be a formula that would automatically update once the arrangment was switched???
PLEASE HELP!!!

 

[JohnRBaker]

Deformable Components and Arrangements are not actually compatiable, and while certain 'kludges' can be done, it will probably not consistently behave as desired.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

http://www.plmworld.org/museum/

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[lorenolepi]

That stinks, is that fixed in NX 7.5? Were updating in a month. I was wondering why sometimes it acts funny in other assy's = sometimes I have to use variable postioning in upper levels.

Thanks John for the quick response...Your the man

 

[JohnRBaker]

No, nothing has changed in NX 7.5. This is not a trivial issue and so there's no easy fix. It will require architectural changes which are not currently planned.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

http://www.plmworld.org/museum/

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[Pretengineer]

I was working on the same thing in NX6. I have two arrangements A and B with one constraint that varies from 5in to 7in. I am referencing an associative measurement for the length of my spring. While changing the distance constraint the measurement will update, but when I change the arrangement the measurement will not update.
If it were possible to have the variable for the arrangement A and B then use an if/then statement in the length it seams like it would work. Is there a variable for the arrangement?

 

[JohnRBaker]

Measurements are also not 'compatible' with Arrangements.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

http://www.plmworld.org/museum/

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[BOPdesigner]

Your spring length should change when your measurement expression changes which should happen when your parts position change relative to each other in the assembly. That being said we ran across a similar case like this where the measurement expression was not updating as it should in NX 6 a few months ago. I think it got turned into a PR. Next week I will have to check if there was a workaround which might help you.