Assembly constraints?? Why so difficult?

[kimrivers]

Any clues how to quickly figure this out because we are about to ditch trying to constrain parts. I was off a few months and come back to be forced to use assembly constraints and boy does it suck. I have spent about an hour trying to correctly position sheet metal parts with odd angles and it will turn it everyway but the way I want. If I align to one side it flips it upside down , if I try to use distance then it moves into space. I just don't understand how and why it has gotten so difficult. I would think I could align a couple faces and call it done. We are concluding it is not worth the time wasted trying to constrain while production is waiting for the parts to build protypes. What a shame that the tool is too difficult to use, smaller companies cannot afford the expensive training and the documentation is difficult to decifer. Probabaly user error but after 15 years on UG i would think I am at the very least average in ability why would you create a program that the average user can waste hours trying to figure out. I see solid works coming in our near future.

 

[Walterke]

1 word: practice

Once you understand how it works, it's really not that hard.

If something flips upside down it's probably because you gave it the wrong constraint. Don't forget that there's a button to get the alternative option of a constraint.

Although I do have to agree on the distance one. It has happened to me as well. Quick solution is to first measure the distance between 2 parts before you apply the distance constraint.

NX 7.5
Teamcenter 8

 

[kimrivers]

Thanks I guess i will have to practice on my own time. For now I have to get this out the door constraint less...Just seems like if you say touch align face to face it is a no brainer..thanks for your reply.

 

[cowski]

'Touch' will force the face normals to point toward each other, 'Align' will force the face normals to point in the same direction.

 

[tsjaikdus]

I don't know if this is of help, but I always drag the parts to constrain below the parent part in the assembly tree. It's not too much of a solution, because the constrains are lost when I move the parts to the correct position in the tree again. But still I use this method a lot because it is faster than move.

 

[bruwel]

Kim, if your company will go for it, model everything in 3D space. Then only fasteners will have to be constrained. You are right it sucks. All to often when you go to assign a constraint THE WRONG PART MOVES. Ok, no brainer, I will select them in the opposite order. HAH, same thing. Then after you nail a bunch in place one will go bad. Happy hunting. Especially, if the error is from a sub-component filtering up to the parent.