Mass questions

[jacek0841]

Inventor 2008 - What to do so the mass of a part "propagates" to next assy - to next assy etc - to part dwg - to assy dwg.

Have had 5.5 years on Solid Works (till very recently). Know $PRP etc. Now have to use Inventor - 3 day experience.

Thanks for all the answers.

 

[aardvarkdw]

You shouldn't have to do anything. As long as you have the correct material set for each part the assembly should calculate the total mass automatically. You may need to select update in iProperties\physical tab if you have made changes since the last time you checked the mass but other than that you should not have to do anything to get Inventor to calculate the mass.

David

 

[jacek0841]

On the *.ipt under iProperties, tab Physical I have mat'l, density and Mass=12.66 kg (Area etc).

Yet on .idw I get N/A for <MASS\P2;>

Obviously something is wrong, but what ??

 

[aardvarkdw]

Is that a user parameter? Where did you get <Mass\P2;> ? That isn't a recognized function as far as I know.

David

 

[jacek0841]

Interesting ... If you try to edit it, a window pops up saying Type: Physical Properties - Model, Property - MASS.

If you "enter" it by icon on the right, it shows up in the window below as <MASS>, but when you finally hit OK and exit that pop up window it shows up in the Title Block (which is still in "edit" mode) as <MASS\P2;>

Now, the drawing template seems to be created by our "parent" company - perhaps this is the problem ??

(4 days on Inventor - I think I have a long way to go ... :-( )

 

[aardvarkdw]

Could be an addin or macro that is causing this. Can you post a screen shot of what you are seeing and maybe one of the addins list?

David

 

[jacek0841]

I experimented with <MASS\P2;> a bit, I think contrary to what you say it is a perfectly legal thing coming from Inventor - it means Precision 2 decimal places.

I guess the error is somewhere earlier - somwhere "between" part and drawing, or perhaps even at the part/assy level ...

 

[aardvarkdw]

This must be a new functionality in 2008, sorry I forgot to mention that I use 11 still.

Try opening the Assembly\part file that is referenced in the drawing and update the mass. I don't know that I will be of much more help in troubleshooting this if you are using newer software. You might try posting to the Autodesk message board,

http://discussion.autodesk.com/forum.jspa?forumID=78&threadID=558879

and see if you get a better response.

David

 

[jacek0841]

Well, if you have an assy (2 welded parts) the mass does not show up on assy even though it does show up on both details (*.ipt). Go figure ...

 

[aardvarkdw]

Did you update the physical properties of the assembly? It wont calculate automatically (why, I am not sure), you need to open the assembly\weldment and select update from iProperties\Physical tab.

David

 

[jacek0841]

Did you update the physical properties of the assembly?

Tried to do - it does not work. Get N/A in lieu of mass, area etc.

BTW, we are large company and all the software is legal ... So I am starting to guess that there is a ..... in the software ...

 

[aardvarkdw]

Post to the autodesk message board and see if one of the guys from ADesk can shed some light on this. All I can tell you is that it works in 11 and while stranger things have happened I can't see this being a bug that no one has come across yet.

Best of luck.

David