Assembly Drawings - Or Instruction manuals

[KENAT]

Here's one I didn't see in any recent posts.

What is people’s common practice for assembly drawings?

By this I mean do your assembly drawings essentially just show the assembled condition with all the information (parts list, notes etc) needed to define it OR are they more like the instructions you get with flat pack furniture from IKEA/Home Depot/Homebase etc?

My principle which my colleagues in my sub department share is that assembly drawing, like piece part drawing, details the finished component and says what is required/what you’ll accept & not how to get there.

ASME Y14.24 seems to support this, although not that strongly it says at 4.1.3 (d) “depiction of the items in the assy relationship, using sufficient detail for id and orientation of the items.”

I’d be interested to hear what others have to say. As part of our trying to introduce drawing/documentation standards one of the things we’re trying to do is get away from assy drawings that double as assembly instructions and instead create true work instructions as required.

We’re facing a lot of resistance, especially from people that perceive this as being extra work and I’d be interested to hear what other people do.

Thanks,

Ken

 

[KENAT]

aardvarkdw, I think those on your list probably should be on the drawing.

I would have thought orientation can usually be shown in a drawing view but I sometimes amplify it with a note like you.

Don't know about anyone else but I've always had to be careful how to word my notes for things like this or the checker wouldn't like it, for instance:

‘Prior to assembly, bearing, item X, to be cleaned and lubricated’

Not

‘Clean and lubricate bearing, item X, before assembly’.

Spot the difference?

If I’ve got my grammar correct then in the first one you’re specifying a requirement, in the second you’re giving them an instruction.

(Pleas note, a checker didn’t look at this so I may have it slightly wrong)

 

[aardvarkdw]

I concur!

 

[ewh]

If only all checkers were so exacting, there would be fewer confusing drawings.

 

[ctopher]

An item # may be called out for the lubricant. I have always used process docs that are called out for this. For example, ‘Prior to assembly, bearing, item X, to be cleaned and lubricated per XXXXXX’. The XXXXXX would be your process spec doc number.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks 06 4.1/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home (updated 06-21-05)

 

[KENAT]

I wondered if anyone would spot that. Ctopher you're correct that (at least from what I'm used to) the lube should as a minimum have an item no. & be in the parts list, I was trying to be brief.

Also something like lubrication sometimes needs a process spec.

Perhaps I picked a bad example, I was trying to use something off aardvarks list.