Un-modelled items in BOM 3

[tluxon]

Is there a simple and effective way to add items to a BOM that are not in the supporting assembly model? Whenever I add new items to an assembly, the numbering of the manually added items gets thrown off.

In the past when I got an assembly drawing to the manufacturing level of detail, I would just import SolidWorks views into AutoCAD drawings. This time I want to keep everything in SolidWorks if possible, as changes are being made by the minute and we're refining what we want to include at the various assembly stages (vendor effort <-> internal effort).

Unfortunately, I haven't found a way to link a manually created BOM item to a balloon. Is there a way to do this that I'm missing?

I want the items in the BOM to follow the order in the assembly model, since I have multiple sheets and only one BOM on the drawing. To update item numbers in each view on other sheets, I create a new local BOM associated with that view and then delete it. Since changes are happening rapidly, I need this to be simple. That is why I'm controlling the order of BOM items through the model.

Are there ways to do what I need without doing a bunch of custom programming? I don't really have the time allocated to this project to cover much programming.

Thanks,

Tim

 

[BBJT]

You have probably just hit a sore spot of many users. Why give somebody the option to manually modify the BOM if the BOM wipes it out later? Please enter in an enhancement request on the BOM and don't hold back. We are pretty much to the point of writing our own BOM program, or a really big band-aid program.

Now to you question. You could create a blank part with all the custom props filled in for the BOM. If you need to balloon to it you could start a sketch in the blank part and just drop a point into it. You now have something to balloon too.

If anybody from SW Corp is looking on, this should be at the top of your list for the next release! Give us something that we can modify that will not change! Any manual edits or unchecking of Items in the BOM properties does not stick!
BBJT CSWP

 

[dsi]

I have been complaining about this since SW97 or 98. We manually add items to the end of our BOMs for bolting, to avoid inserting hundreds of parts. Instead, we just changed the item numbers for those items. For example, our BOM will contain numbers in the item field but we label our bolting with letters. This seems to stick inside of the BOM whereas using the same format does not.
1 Some Part
2 Some Other Part
...
B1 Bolt Type 1
B2 Bolt Type 2

It doesn't solve the issue at hand, but at least it's a workaround for this seemingly untouched SW issue. DimensionalSolutions@Core.com
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[Standing]

We do the same thing BBJT does with a dummy part and point to that part. If we need 12 of those parts then we put in 12 dummy parts. The problem we have is that we must manually edit the BOM to put in units of measure such as feet. I have put in an enhancement request, but we need more people putting in the requests.

 

[BBJT]

Bradley hit the nail right in the head when stating that &quot;we need more people putting in the request.&quot; The more enhancements the real world users enter the better the chance that SolidWorks will listen.

I personaly think it is time for SolidWorks to spend more time making the features that they offer work more reliable and less time making it look pretty. Don'get me wrong, I am amazed with every release that comes out but it would be really amazing to see existings bugs and limitations get fixed. BBJT CSWP

 

[BBJT]

dsi,
Are you saying that you enter in B1 at the end of BOM. Example :
1
2
3
4
B1
B2
What happens when you add another part to the assembly? Does it get added above the B1 or below the B2. Does the B1 and B2 even remain in the BOM? BBJT CSWP

 

[tluxon]

&quot;...Are you saying that you enter in B1 at the end of BOM. Example :
1
2
3
4
B1
B2
What happens when you add another part to the assembly? Does it get added above the B1 or below the B2. Does the B1 and B2 even remain in the BOM?...&quot;

I've done this and yes, the B1 and B2 remain in the assembly, but new items get added after it, so B1 and B2 must be relocated to the end of the BOM manually. The advantage to doing this is that your item balloons won't have to be re-&quot;numbered&quot; whenever new items are added to the assy.

 

[dsi]

Yep! You don't really even have to have an item number for manually entered items. We have a couple of lines that only contain a description. We only have problems when we continue using the numerical sequence used by SW. If you add another part to the assembly, the new parts get added below the manually entered items. Worst case, you just copy and paste below the new item. If you add another instance of a part that is already there, SW will update the quantity in the BOM accordingly. DimensionalSolutions@Core.com
While I welcome e-mail messages, please post all thread activity in these forums for the benefit of all members.

 

[BBJT]

Interesting. This may help a quite a few people out. In our case however, this may not be an option. We are a large corporation that is very anal on keeping things the same and standardized. Dsi method gives me something to think about though. Like I stated earlier, I am probably going to be writting a big band-aid of a program to work with what SolidWorks offers now. Thanks for the feeback. BBJT CSWP

 

[dsi]

Yeah, it's not the way we wanted to go about it, but inserting hundreds of bolts into the assemblies for the sake of a free BOM was much more trouble than it was worse. I would actually like to see a DUMMY part that you could insert into an assembly and control the quantity through some type of setting. Then, just insert once and have it call out however many you specify. Until then ... DimensionalSolutions@Core.com
While I welcome e-mail messages, please post all thread activity in these forums for the benefit of all members.

 

[dogarila]

I've got this problem too. Instead of adding lots of identical dummy parts I add just one, fix it, and use component pattern to multiply it. You can also create different configurations to the dummy part, with config specific properties and manually change the configuration for parts inside the pattern.

Andrew

 

[dasarge]

GENTLEMEN
I JUST TRIED THIS
WHEN ADDING THE BOM DESELECT THE OPTION FOR ROW NUMBER FOLOW ASSEMBLY ORDER ON THE CONTROL TAB IN BOM PROPERTIES
SELECT YES ON RESERVE ROW NUMBERS FOR MISSING COMPONENTS DISPLAY WITH ZERO QUANTITY
THEM IN THE EXCEL SPREAD SHEET FORMAT THE ROWS TO TEXT
RIGHT CLICK AND SELECT
FORMAT CELLS
NUMBER TAB SELECT TEXT
I AM NOT SURE IF THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT YOU HAD IN MIND BUT IT COULD BE A WORK AROUND

 

[odmullen]

A couple of suggestions:

1. Group new parts and the associated fasteners as a subassembly so it's easy to find the fasteners in the BOM. The fasteners could be dummy parts with only a point for insertion and the required properties for BOM. This will ensure that the BOM is correctly updated as to part count, but you may get a number of different lines for the same fastener, which complicates take-off. If you are methodical about the assignment of properties, the take-off person can work with the BOM in Excel to sort and collect like items. This method will simplify changes if you are removing parts and fasteners sometimes. This won't isolate the fasteners in one section of the BOM, however.

2. You could leave &quot;BOM follows Assembly Ordering&quot; on and organize your assembly in the feature manager: Keep established parts in their order at the top of the FM. Add new parts at the end of the main parts section. Put replacement parts in the same position as the originals(optional). Place fasteners at the bottom of the assembly. You could separate the parts from the fasteners with some blank parts to reserve numbers so you can (if you leave enough blanks) keep the fasteners section numbering constant without losing the automatic updating. You'll have to check at each revision to make sure you have deleted the same number of placeholder parts as you have added parts.

I haven't implemented all of this since we don't get that fussy about how our BOM's are organized, but I have tried some elements of it. Your mileage may vary....

 

[cjquijano]

We are just getting ready to impliment SW and this is the approach I am looking at. Lets say i have an assembly of a machine and it requires 3.5 quarts of oil.

I have added a Number and Scaler custom property to our model templates. Now I have created a part called &quot;oil-sae30&quot; with multiple configuration. For each configuration the Number is the same. Its our part number of the oil. Now, for each configuration, the Scaler property represents the number of quarts of oil (the defauly value is 1).

Now, I have modified the BOM table in the following way. The Part_No and QTY fields have been hidden. I have added another field for Number, Scaler (which is hidden), and Quantity. Below the label Quantity I have entered &quot;+QTY*Scaler&quot;, then I have copied this down 200 rows. Out longest BOM should only be around 150.

Now, when I drag part &quot;oil-sae30.sldprt&quot; into the model, I pick the configuration &quot;3.5 Quarts&quot;, and then I add the BOM table. It now shows a quantity of 3.5 for the oil.

I've tested it about a dozen times so far and it seems to work every time.

Christopher Quijano