Associative Datums/Axis

[UGMENTALCASE]

Good morning all!

Just recently we have had a situation where we have submitted some files to a customer which don't have associative datums/CSYS in them. Now it's been said we are getting the files back to go throught them and sort out anything that not associative. No does anyone know of an easy quick way to may run a journal or grip program or anything that may scan for CSYS in the parts, or maybe filter the Part Navigator. Or better still tell me which ones aren't associative or which ones are 'fixed'. I'm currently trying to get the filters working but not having much joy, not sure if it's my customer environment that's stopping it from working or not....

Any help would be great!

 

[JohnRBaker]

What version of NX are you running?

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

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

 

[UGMENTALCASE]

Hi John, its nx 7.5

 

[JohnRBaker]

Well, there are a couple of things to understand, unless your first object is some piece of geometry there will be no way to avoid having at least ONE non-associative Datum CSYS. Besides, most people use a Modeling template which contains a non-associative Datum CSYS located and oriented relative to absolute.

Now as for other Datum type objects, such as Points (yes, Points are considered by many to be a type of Datum, but one which only defines a location and nothing else), Datum Axis (defining a direction vector) and Datum Planes (defining a direction vector, the plane normal, and a location along that vector).

Forgetting Points for now, at least with Datum Axis and Datum Planes, it'e easy to find those which are not associated to anything since they will be named with the prefix 'Fixed', such as 'Fixed Datum Axis' or 'Fixed Datum Plane', which you can see by simply looking at the Part Navigator. Or you can create a 'Filter' to hide everything except the 'Fixed' Datums which will help when sorting out complex models.

As for non-Associative Datum CSYS's that's a different issue since by definition even a non-associative Datum CSYS is considered to be a perfectly valid object so the system does not provide any special designation or way to 'filter' for them. Perhaps a program could be written to look at all of the Datum CSYS and see if any of them have a 'parent' since this is what it would be mean to be Associative.

That being said, I have to ask, if you were able to find these non-Associative 'Datums', what do you intend to do next? Non-Associative 'Datums' can be edited, changing them to Associative and referencing some geometric feature or some other Datum, but that would be a lot of manual work.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

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

 

[UGMENTALCASE]

Hi john,
this is where its crazy. From what i can work out customer considers dynamic csys as fixed, even though they're not. So we are having to get our files back and go through them and make the associative, by editing them so they are positioned by z plane, x axis and origin point. Or at least that's what i can work out from what im being told. I think they're a little confused also! I've got the filter to go to sketches only then highlight them all and make datum's external and then double click each one to see how its put in, but obviously each file will start slightly different. I might look into that, was thinking might be able to run something like check mate does and highlights in the part navigator the sketch or whatever that needs attention. This is how daft it is, our customer specifies no fixed datum's/axis, yet allocates 10 layers for fixed datum's and axis!