Sketch! Sketch! Constrain! Constrain!!
CAD doesn’t have to be complex. Most of the parts we design are very simple. Sometimes you need a specialty feature like a Helix or a complex loft or some other rarely used feature. So why are we all using the complex Pro/E paradigm? It was not the first solid modeling solution. But it is the one that caught on and made enough money for many to duplicate and set as a standard for the others to imitate. It really is not the most efficient way to create parts.
I have taken some time to learn both Inventor and Solidworks to make my engineering services more marketable. I tell you it is quite a chore to design in the Pro/E paradigm. It is so much more work. As I do my conceptual design it seems okay. But after a design review and I have to go back and make some changes I think I would rather have a root canal.
Change is no fun on any system, especially if you have been away from the project for a couple months. You basically have to review how you did the part and this can take hours depending how extreme the changes. I am sure many have found it easier to redo the parts, of course, that leaves the door open to Murphy’s law. Now if you are not the original designer this is even a more of a horror show. As you know some CAD operators are more equal than others.
There are two paradigm to CAD design. History/Feature based modeling and Direct Editing. Both are good systems. I personally like to start with History based and then move to Direct edit for changes. Now there are a few things that Direct edit will not edit, like helical shapes and few others. But you can usually create most of the features over if necessary.
Programs such as PTC Creo, Siemens NX, and Autodesk Inventor have external direct modules. I have used Autodesk Fusion and it is a good direct editor but the interoperability with Inventor leaves a bit to be desired. IRONCAD/INOVATE are the only programs that have both of these paradigms integrated. Not only does IRONCAD/INOVATE have both paradigms it also has a unique way of creating parts. Check out a review and history of IRONCAD.
What are you using now to utilize the engineering data, or do you even know this capability is available? To implement this in your current system you would need expensive modules or a separate package for each job. This is most cost effect solution and so easy to implement. Please attend our webinar or if you can’t make it give me a call and I can give you a presentation of these great capabilities.
Enter Drag & Drop and Catalogs
I want to introduce you to a proven alternative to the standard sketch, sketch, constrain, constrain procedure of design. IRONCAD uses drag and drop functionality. Yes you select a positive or negative shape from a standard catalog of shapes, drag to the user space. This is not new, IRONCAD has been around since the middle 90’s. We will not go into why it is not widely known but I feel now is the time for you to see and experience this very productive alternative.
This is a very easy to use interface, but it has very sophisticated and powerful capabilities. Let’s take a look as some of the basics. Look on the right side and notice the shapes in one of the standard catalogs. I have Drag & Dropped some shapes into the work space. You can see some what are called hole or negative shapes Drag & Dropped on the solids. On the middle block you can see the Push/Pull handles. On the left is the scene browser or tree. You can see the block highlighted and showing the features that make up the part. Also notice that all are separate parts in the same space without external references. You can make them external reference parts or insert referenced parts if necessary.
Let’s take a look what a shape consist of. You can see a sketch. Yes, it is imbedded in the feature itself and can be edited. Now you can also design with sketches just like Solidworks and sometimes you do. You have feature based sketches and non-associative sketches that can be utilized later. Also you can take any face and create a new feature or make it a new part. It is incredibly flexible.
Let’s take a look at some of the standard Catalogs. The Tools Catalog include Assembly, Bearing, Cold Formed Steel, Custom Holes, Fasteners, Helix and other shape and procedures. There are two more standard Catalogs: Colors, Bumps and Textures.
Shapes Adv Shapes Sheet Metal Animation Surfaces Tools
Custom Catalogs and custom shapes, features, parts and assemblies.
Have you ever had a time of trying to design a special cavity. It is very tough working through the existing graphics. But with IRONCAD you can take any part and make it a negative. I have created the red part as negative when Booleaned. I have dragged it in to our custom catalog and dragged it on to the green block. I performed a simple Boolean join and you can see we now have our positive part now cut into the green block.
Look at the feature cut in the grey block then look over in the catalog and you can see the feature stored there. I dragged it out and created the second feature in the grey block. So you can see you can have custom shapes and features stored in specific Catalogs.
The IRONCAD TriBall – Imitated but Never Duplicated
Hailed by some as “the most useful tool in the history of CAD,” The TriBall is a powerful and flexible tool for performing 3D spatial transformations in IRONCAD/INOVATE. The TriBall is used many other applications within IRONCAD besides just positioning parts and assemblies such as:
� Part and Assembly Positioning
� Feature and Profile Plane Positioning
� Direct Face Modeling, Loft and Sweep Path Manipulation
� Key Frame Animation Path Manipulation
� Texture Mapping Placement
� Camera, Point and Spot Light Positioning
� Anchor and Attachment Point Positioning
� Feature and Profile Plane Positioning
� Direct Face Modeling, Loft and Sweep Path Manipulation
� Key Frame Animation Path Manipulation
� Texture Mapping Placement
� Camera, Point and Spot Light Positioning
� Anchor and Attachment Point Positioning
I will show a bit about the TriBall.
On the left is one hole on this bolt circle. On right we move the TriBall to the center they select the axis we want to rotate the hole around and move the TriBall and a menu comes up asking if we want to move, copy, link or create a radial pattern.
Here is another example of using the TriBall mirroring and linking parts and assemblies.
One more copying assemblies. We can move the TriBall to the midpoint on an edge and then define how many copies we want. We will link these to define them a duplicate parts for listing in the BOM.
There are so much more to show you that gives IRONCAD the advantage over virtually any other CAD system. Please review my earlier articles at “Leverage Your Engineering Data Series”
Here are a few features that I feel are advantages:
1. History Based Solid Modeling
INOVATE offers history based solid modeling. I enjoy the option of using history based design when starting my design
2. Explicit Solid Modeling
History based solid modeling can get very complex as the feature list grows. That is the advantage to all of our products. We can virtually edit any solid model. INOVATE offers a high level of feature editing. Of course you can convert many features like blends and holes to editable features. 3. Drag n' Drop Shapes
3. UDE (Unified Design Environment) Conceptual Design!
You can design in one file, not worrying about naming parts until the design is done. You can reference parts in IRONCAD when necessary. You can import very large assemblies from other CAD packages in minutes. No need to populate your hard drive with hard to find parts.
4. Drag and Drop
You design by dragging and dropping shapes and features from standard catalogs.
5. Catalogs
You have standard catalog containing many shapes and features. What is beautiful you can create your own custom catalogs just by dragging parts or assemblies from the screen and dropping it in the catalog.
6. Parametric Design
Yes you can do parametric design.
7. Realistic Rendering
Realistic Rendering is an integrated function.
8. Animation
Animation is also integrated and very sophisticated.
9. Kinematics.
You can do kinematic motion studies with collision detection.
10. A Unique Drawing Environment.
The drawings are associated to the assembly model so you can detail the unique parts in one drawing file.
11. There so many other incredible features and capabilities please check this out to see a list of all the features and aComparison between INOVATE and IRONCAD.
