ARRANGEMENTS

[jkcone]

Hello,
I'm using "arrangements" for the first time.
In a nut shell is the scope of what arrangements do is to turn on & off different sets of assembly constraints & that's all?

Thanks,
James

 

[looslib]

Turns on and off different components in your views.


"Wildfires are dangerous, hard to control, and economically catastrophic."

Ben Loosli

 

[JohnRBaker]

Arrangements are used so that sub-assemblies used in a higher-level assembly can be shown in either alternative positions or with alternative content, but without having to create a completely new assembly file to accomplish this. For example, lets say you have a valve assembly where you were going to be include 2 of them in a higher-level assembly, but you wished to show one valve open and the other valve closed, yet the Parts List should show that they are both the same, that is a single reference with a quantity of 2. What you would do is when creating the valve assembly with say the default configuration of the valve being 'Open', you would create a second arrangement and move the components necessary to show the valve as being 'Closed' and save this as an alternative Arrangement. Then when adding the valve assembly to another assembly you will now have the choice of adding the valve using either Arrangement, or if there are more than one valve in the assembly, using either Arrangement, yet the Parts List will see all of these valve assemblies as the same part file.

You can also do this same thing with substituting some components in the assembly with other components so that each arrangement could be made up of different components.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

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To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[jkcone]

Thanks for your replies guys.

Looslib,
I hadn't though about using it to show & hide different components, thanks.

John,
You mentioned moving parts around to show the second arrangement but didn't mention using assembly constraints. I first tried doing it like this but was unable to get it to work until I used constraints & set them to arrangement specific. I can't figure out what I missed on my first attempt without the constraints. Any suggestions?

NX6

James

 

[JohnRBaker]

First create your new Arrangement, set it to be the 'used' one, move your component however you wish and that's it. Now if you switch from one Arrangement to another, you will see the orignal position in the default Arrangement and the new alternative position in the new Arrangement. It's just that if you're going to actually constrain the position of the Component(s), then you're going to need to create Arrangement specific constraints. However, if the Components are unconstrained, then the Arrangement will remember whatever the positions were when you last Moved them while that Arrangement was active (i.e. Used).

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[jkcone]

John,
I just tried it again & the parts don't move back to the default arrangement. I'm assuming this should work whether I'm in the part which the arrangements are created in or it's parent assembly. Apparently I missed something?

Thanks,

James

 

[JohnRBaker]

You have to be in the Assembly in which you're creating the Arranements in.

Have you looked at the NX Help files? There a fairly good explanation of how to set up two Arrangements with different positioning of the Components of an Assembly.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[jkcone]

Thanks John, I'll look in the help again.

James

 

[cowski]

First create your new Arrangement, set it to be the 'used' one, move your component however you wish and that's it.

Actually, there is one more step: right click on the component that you want to move into a new arrangement and in the component properties dialog (Parameters tab) make sure the "Arrangements" option is "Individually positioned" instead of the default "Same position in all".

 

[jkcone]

Volia, that did it, thanks cowski.

James

 

[JohnRBaker]

Sorry, forgot about that setting. Thanks cowski.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[jkcone]

No need to apologize, all you guys help a lot. I bet you have many threads & things going on at once.

What is the need of such a setting? Is it just a safety factor?

Jmaes

 

[JohnRBaker]

The intention is to allow you a degree of control over the effective 'range', as it were, that this is affecting the various Arrangements. Think of a situation where you've already created several different Arrangements using the normal 'teach' mode of positioning individual Components and then suddenly you need to make a global change which you want to be applied to ALL existing Arrangements. This is where you could direct that what you going to do next is to be applied to (remembered by) ALL Arrangements. Or conversely, if you wish to make a change to only one, you make that the active Arrangement, set the option to 'Individually Positioned', make your change and you're good to go.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[jkcone]

Love this software!

 

[PDW]

I got a question on this matter.

Can you apply the "Same Position in All" when you allready have created an Arrangements.
I cannot sellect this options, because when I want to change it from "Individually Positioned" to "Same Position in All" , I get the message "Unable to edit the arrangement positiong on some components"

thnx,




Best regards,

Pascal,

NX5.04+TC2007 (GM Toolkit) / NX7.5 native

 

[Aerohawk]

Yup I have the same question as PascalDW. After I change a component in an assembly to Individually positioned (by right clicking it > properties > Parameters> arrangement). I can 't seem to change it back to "Same position in all".

I get the message "Unable to edit the arrangement positiong on some components"

This happens in all assemblies so I haven't given a specific case. I hope I have provided enough information.

Any Ideas about how I can get it back to Same position in all

Thanks
Vik

 

[stormyb]

Yesterday i also used arrangements for the first time between two parts. I used it to display a static open position in drawing, so i can play with the positions of the models in my assembly without messing up the drawing. The angular mate didn't behave well. I picked two faces of two different models (which faced at eachother, open / close position) and want to add a angle of 45 degrees. Offcourse it picked the opposite angle (like -45 degrees). So I tried 45+270. It results in the same position.... So i tried other angles to test. 135, 135+180, 180, 181 which actually gives a result of 179. The angle didn't pass 180 degrees... very frustrating.
Tried several solutions, like change the order of picking faces and at last i even picked another face. I picked two faces which were facing in the same direction, not looking at eachother. Luckely my models have parallel faces. That seems to work. Now i can rotate the parts more than 180 degrees. Is this a known issue?

 

[JohnRBaker]

I'll bet that you were using the '3D Angle' method for your angle constraint, correct?

Try using 'Orient Angle' instead. Note that while it takes less set-up to use the '3D Angle' method, if you're setting up something which you expect to edit in the future, 'Orient Angle' is more reliable, particularly if the angle changes could be large. However, if all you're doing to setting up a 'fixed' angle, or one which any future change will be small, then '3D Angle' is usually adequate.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[stormyb]

Thanks for your reply. I was using the 3D-angle.
Only on the drawing i wanted another position to show parts inside.

I also tried the orient angle. I can't get a grip on it. It results in a incorrect constraint (with a note of exclamation)and the two parts stayed in their original position.
Am i correct this is the way to do it:

1) Point the axis for angle (the axis of the hingepin between the two parts) also tried a
2) point face on one part (fixed part)
3) point face on other part
4) apply angle

 

[JohnRBaker]

I'd have to at least see an image of what it is that you're attempt to constrain before I could advice you. If you do provide an image, please indicate on it where you think the axis of the rotation should be and the items you're trying to apply an angle between.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

UG/NX Museum:

http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.