×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

Copy Assembly & Drawings?

Copy Assembly & Drawings?

Copy Assembly & Drawings?

(OP)
I know I can use the File>Find Referances to copy a complete assembly to another location.  Is there a way to also copy the drawings?  I would like the copied assembly and drawings to be associated with eachother, but be completely disassociated with the source assembly and drawings.

Mike Puckett
Group Leader
Los Angeles/Orange County
Solidworks User Group

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

Not yet unless you're using PDMWorks.  I heard a lot of people suggesting that one, though.

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

Mike,

If your files (parts, assemblies, drawings)are all contained within one (top level)folder you can copy the entire folder in win Explorer.  Then go the SW explorer and rename the part and assemblies files.  You can also rename the drawing files in SW explorer or win explorer.  this will give you 2 seperate files (projects) with all the parts assemblies and drawings with unique names in seperate locations (folders).  Its easier to do this in PDMWorks and it looks like SW 2007 is going to make this easier also.

Rob Rodriguez CSWP
President: Northern
Vermont SolidWorks User Group
www.robrodriguez.com (updated 1/30/06)
SW 2006 SP 3.0

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

I prefer using SW Expl. Renaming SW files in Win Exp will break links. I agree with the others that PDMWorks is easier.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks/PDMWorks 05
AutoCAD 05
ctopher's home site (updated 06-21-05)
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

What I have done in the past is save a new assembly in a new directory, changing the names of all the parts using save as. I then copy the drawings to the new directory with Windows Explorer, renaming them to match the new part numbers.
Temporarily change the name of the original assembly host directory so the parts cannot be found by SW.
Open each of the drawings in turn. The part will not be found, you find it yourself by clicking to the new part number. It should open correctly and each of the drawings can then be saved. When you are done, rename the original host directory back to what it should be.
This is crude, but has worked since SW98 or so.

--
Hardie "Crashj" Johnson
SW 2005 SP 4.0 (reluctant to change)
Matrox Millenium G550
AMD Athalon 1.8 GHz 512 Meg RAM

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

(OP)
Yeah, looks like there isnt an easy way to do this untill 2007 comes out.  Also not much of a chance of getting PDMworks either.  Looks like Rob's idea is the quickest.

Thanks for the input.

Mike Puckett
Group Leader
Los Angeles/Orange County
Solidworks User Group

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

Another way, using SW Explorer, is to copy the assy drawing(s) & select the Copy Children option, deselect any standard (library) parts which need not be copied. Then copy the part drawing(s) again using the Copy Children option.

cheers
Helpful SW websites  FAQ559-520
How to get answers to your SW questions  FAQ559-1091

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

I should clarify.  You will want to rename your files using SW explorer (always do this).  It is possible however to rename drawings files with win Explorer and their refrences remain intact.

Rob Rodriguez CSWP
President: Northern
Vermont SolidWorks User Group
www.robrodriguez.com (updated 1/30/06)
SW 2006 SP 3.0

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

One option would be CopyProject.  It copies all
 Assemblies, Models and Drawings associated with the main
 Assembly.  It will copy the File Structure if you wish.
 Plus you set it to rename the new files.  That is what I
 use to copy one project to another location and it works
 o.k. for me.  

Cheers,

Ralph Wright, CSWP
SolidWorks 2005, SP5.0
P4, 2.53Ghz
1.5 Gb RAM
ATI Fire GL8800 Card
Windows 2000 Pro

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

I have just been looking at the very same thing. PDMworks is the best option that comes as part of the SW package. You use the copy project option. It isn't a perfect piece of software by any means so if you are trying to justify it to management then try and get a trial version of it first.

RE: Copy Assembly & Drawings?

It's fairly simple to copy the drawings.  After you have copied the parts and assemblies (I do it using SW itself, right in the open file screen using the references) all you have to do is copy and paste the drawing while you are in the SW open file screen.  After pasting the the drawing file rename it to what you want, highlight the name of the new file then click on references in the open file screen, browse to the new model or assembly that you want, then open the file.  I generally make sure that I don't have any files open when I start this.

mncad

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources