DBWORKS & SW Config Questions

[cygnas]

Is this possible..........

I want to have 1 solid (threaded rod)

5 configurations (only change is length of a threaded rod).

1 2D drawing that will update with the specified configuration desired.

And last..........With all this said, can I have DBWorks link the 5 possible drawings with 1 DBWorks record? Also if I have a chart on the drawing listing all the configurations with dashes (maybe as variant notes) will those variant notes update if a model configuration length changes?

If this is possible, it would be a huge time savings.

 

[ctopher]

yes, create the solid rod, add configs. Go to each config and change the length and check "this config only". Only one dwg per config. For DBWorks ... I don't know.

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 2005 SP0.1

 

[ShaggyPE]

To add to what ctopher stated. Use a design table in your rod model. You can insert this design table into the drawing of the rod. Now when you change the length of the rod, the tabulated data in the drawing will change accordingly.
Don't know about DBWorks either.

 

[MElam]

you state:

I want to have 1 solid (threaded rod)

5 configurations (only change is length of a threaded rod).

1 2D drawing that will update with the specified configuration desired.

but then

can I have DBWorks link the 5 possible drawings with 1 DBWorks record?

Do you want 1 drawing or 5?

Since you want a chart on the drawing listing all of the configs, it sounds like you want 1 tabulated drawing. Create your configs using a design table and insert the table on your drawing (name the configs by their dash numbers). Change the length dim to a variable and get the table to match.

If you do have 1 part record and 5 seperate drawings, DBWorks will link them (right-click, open drawing will list all 5),

As for DBWorks, are you saving configurations as distinct records? This is necessary if you want DBWorks to track the configs/revisions seperately.

 

[cygnas]

MElam,
Ok, now is it possible to do the opposite as well. 1 drawing associated and linked to 5 DBWorks records?

 

[MElam]

I just did some testing and it seems that the drawing associates to whichever record is actually shown in the drawing views. We are still in the middle of implementing the software and deciding how we want to handle these issues.

There are so many options on how DBWorks can handle configs. Right now, mine is set up to "Save configurations only of components with configuration names like:" and you could put in -[0-9][0-9][0-9] for config names like -001, etc. This way, tabulated drawing configs are saved as seperate records but configs like "Simplified" are not.

With this set-up, I can see exactly which config is used in a particular assembly (which I like), but it seems I have to know which config the drawing is based on to get to the drawing (which I don't like). Your DBWorks supplier should be able to help. I'm gonna call mine to help figure this one out.

Since we do not need a seperate revision history for each config (due to them being on one tabulated drawing), we may not need seperate records. But I would still like to see which congfig is used on each assembly.