mmccall

Yes... Go to your scene... Right click in some open area Hit rendering option In the Edge Display Options menu... unselect the "draw part edges" option Hope this helps

This is just a listing of some things that Pro-E offers... Keep in mind that in many cases these are individual modules !! Alot of money involved here!! IC gives the most Bang for the Buck !... Even the so called Foundation Package doesn't have everything you would need.. no sheetmetal!! can you believe that? And another thing... they don't even get the motion package! I have used the Pro-E motion package extensively... my engineers don't even want to attack applying motion to a design... I just do it in IC !! Pro/ENGINEER Foundation Advantage Package $3,996.00 Best-in-class, integrated capabilities for creating assemblies, weldments, fully documented production drawings and photorealistic renderings. Moreover, it contains advanced surfacing, extensive data translators for sharing and reusing engineering data, mechanism design for moving assemblies, shrinkwrap and simplified reps for assemblies, ModelCHECK for aiding data re-use, Import Data Doctor for import data repair and Design Animation for creating animation sequences. Pro/ENGINEER Reverse Engineering Extension $11,996.00 Reverse Engineering Extension enables engineers to create accurate, modifiable Pro/ENGINEER models from 3D scan data quickly while capturing design intent and maintaining critical geometric data that is often needed downstream in the design process. Advanced capabilities include point cloud refinement, facet modeling and refinement, facet modeling and refinement capabilities, primitive shape recognition, analytics, surface to facet deviations, quick pick for complex analytical surfaces, real flats and cylinders, and full control over all surface creation. Pro/ENGINEER Application Programming Toolkit $15,996.00 The application Toolkit allows customers to extend, automate, and customize a wide range of Pro/ENGINEER design-through-manufacturing functionality. Pro/DESKTOP $995.00 The drag-and-drop approach to product design allows the engineer to work directly on the evolving design. With intelligent, feature-based drafting, Pro/DESKTOP can increase both design and drawing productivity. Associative interoperability with Pro/ENGINEER makes Pro/DESKTOP the perfect tool for engineers working together or within a collaborative design environment. Pro/ENGINEER Behavioral Modeling Extension $3,996.00 Allows for true objective-driven design. Build engineering evaluations directly into your models, including links to external applications. Leverage these dynamic evaluations to automatically explore all design variations and drive geometry to solve engineering problems and optimize designs. Includes the ability to manage many variables and even multiple conflicting goals. This product is an extension which is locked to the prerequisite package and does not float independently. NOTE: includes the Mechanism Design Extension (MDX) product. Pro/ENGINEER Mechanism Dynamics Option $3,996.00 Pro/ENGINEER Mechanism Dynamics Option (MDO) provides additional functionality to the Pro/ENGINEER Mechanism Design Extension (MDX), allowing engineers to simulate and improve the dynamic performance of a mechanism as it would operate in real life. MDO is a must where forces and accelerations are important in determining how a mechanism works. Pro/ENGINEER Piping Design Extension $3,996.00 Offers comprehensive and associative capabilities for piping design through manufacturing. Used by system and mechanical designers to accurately design, route, document and manufacture complex piping systems while optimally reusing designs for dramatic time savings and improvements in productivity. This product is an extension which means it cannot float independently of any prerequisites.

Well said! Very effective... I will be using the Robert Andersson response to help convert and instruct the "lost sheep" ! Very detailed explanation on how to "think" through designing in IC vs Pro-E.

Be mindful of which animation path you are manipulating, especially when they all look the same. This has caused me grief more than once. Use the smart motion editor window and the next path button and watch for the desired path to highlight. That way, you know which path you are changing.

I must say that importing geometry in the ACIS format works really well!

Keep anchor locations in mind. Sometimes after resizing and doing other manipulations, I forget all about where my anchor is located. It is a real benefit to go back and put the anchor someplace logical before you do the animations. The anchor can really help with controlling animation paths with the triball since thats where the animation path will be applied.

Intelligent use of smart dimensions can really help with constraining parts and can give more freedom to what may seem like a one way street when applying animations.

Hold on guys/gals... this one may be of some real value to you! Copying an assembly or the assembly of another externally linked object a 2nd time in the same scene, meaning you now have 2 of the same objects in the same scene (one is a linked copy/paste of the other or inserted again using the Insert Part/Assembly button). IC will give you a warning message, something like the inserted part is the same configuration. If the 1st object already has an animation path tied to it and you get this second object in there by any of the pre-described means, you may find that the animation of the 1st component will become volatile. It may loose all of its motions and constraints even if they are locked, and in most cases, the constraints will continue to show even though they no longer work. The animation path will still show up in the smart motion editor even though they no longer work ( I have another thread in Bug Reports called Smart-motion Editor Ghosts !). You have several things you can TRY at this point. They all have some issues typically reverting back to NOT WORKING ! 1) Start over, meaning re-assign all the motions again. Problem: You may find that IC wont let you do it. Remember, you still have these linked objects in the same scene. So you can go ahead and animate one part; it will work fine, but as soon as you apply some other animation to the second identical part, it will apply those animations to the parent or the 1st one again, really screwing things up in a major way now!! Or maybe nothing will move at all ! 2) Try dragging the second identical object in as an intellishape. Problem: IC wont like this one either. Im not really sure why, but BAM! Start over because you WILL get into that same do-loop as in option 1, maybe not now, but possibly later, like next Tuesday. Its happened to me twice, really screwing things up in a major way!! Only the customer is at your door and you really look like a fool; better show off at how fast it can be fixed. Can you say smoke and mirrors? 3) Backing out because you think you previously saved the good animation; that seems easy enough. Problem: BAM fooled you IC already changed everything as soon as you dropped that 2nd linked object in there. Forget it !!. Its all jacked up !! START OVER !! That previous animation you thought was saved is gone! Oh yeah, never mind about whats showing up in the smart motion editor or all your constraints showing; its just a ghost ! None of these events are isolated. I have repeated these options with the same results- lost constraints and animations and ghosts everywhere. NOW LETS LOOK AT THE ONLY WAY I HAVE FOUND THAT WILL WORK! (really you have 2 options- one will keep them linked-the other totally separates them) 1) Save the object again as something else ( now you have the same object just 2 different names. Then you can add it into the assembly with no problems. Its just that they arent linked, so any changes you need to make will have to be done twice-not a good option in some cases. 2) To keep the ability to have two of the same file linked, animated differently and in the assembly, you need to go to this 1st component, do another Save/as Assembly Part, and give it a new name, something B. Now, you will notice that the background colors have changed. The B part will carry all the changes you make to part A. Now, all you have to do is put it into the assembly. They can be animated independently with no risk of loosing any constraints or paths. And best of all, any changes to part A will show up on part B. Some of you out there may have already figured this out, but I really hope this helps someone.

For some reason, on occasion, I can copy a component or multiple components in an assembly I am working on and sometime later once I try to save, I get a corrupt part error or something like corrupt geometry. the part needs to be regenerated etc. Well, after you say OK , you dont really know what happened. The dialog box doesnt give you any real detail as to which part is creating the problem or anything. For that matter you, dont even know if anything is fixed! I can save it again, and everything works just fine, but surely enough sometime later, maybe 2 days later, that error message will come up again! And if it happens once you open the file, youre in real trouble. You know what that meansSomething is gone! Good luck at finding it. If you are in the habit of using the Use Edge command, you may find that some of your sketches will create these Corrupt Geometry Sketch messages and the part needs to be regenerated dialog reports. Any body else seeing anything like this?

Yes.. that makes sense... Thanks.

Yes.. I saw that handle but in this case I was just hoping to be able to change a value... I guess the real desire is to be able to simply key in a new value. And it just so happens that this shape is complex and mirrored.. so the handle makes the face pul away from the center line of the part... In which case I can simply use that face move option and the triball to straighten everything out. Thanks.

Lately I have been using the surface thicken command as a way to cut profiles or like a surface cutting tool..using the boolean comands. After thickening the surface, If I need it to be thicker, do I always have to recreate the surface shape? Meaning where is the dialog or window so I can change its thicken value? After I have made the surface thicknes 1"... how or where can I change this to 2" ??

In the end, its Us vs. Them For a long time, PTC dominated the so-called midrange CAD arena and I began to worry. Monopolies are not good, and it seemed as though they were well on their way to becoming one. But here we are with a host of options to make our lives easier, thanks to the brave souls who ventured out on their own. I was recently criticized by someone for always comparing IronCad to Pro-E and that I do so because they are the best. In that persons mind, by always referring to Pro-E, I somehow proved this point. Actually, and sadly I must admit, Pro-E seems to be the necessary reference point because it is well entrenched in the CAD programs sector and to me, it is a perfect example of unnecessary complexity that most people can relate to. The person that criticized me feels that IronCad isnt in the same class, despite being proven otherwise in every case. Lately, my interest has been in IronCad surface modeling capability due to an event that occurred this month. In short, a Pro-E expert at another company created a plastic shroud for industrial engineers, a pretty nice looking alien shape. He used surfaces for every feature. Bravo! That is a real test of skill, but with a fatal flaw - the model is extremely unstable. This guy didnt have any of the ribs or bosses; he didnt have any of the necessary features to make this a functional part. It was just a pretty picture. I began helping one of my friends at this company to complete the file (my friend was born and raised on Pro-E; he is extremely talented. I have converted him over to the dark side! How about that!). Regardless of what we did, such as adding a protrusion, BAM! - regeneration errors, geometry checks, you name it. The original file has 350 features. My friend totally re-created the model and reduced the number of features to 135 by using surfaces in an intelligent manner, not just because the tool is there. The Pro-E administrator at this company said that IC could not do surfaces. Looking at this example, it seems as though Pro-E cant do them either! I already know how to use surfaces in Pro-E and now my interest is developing my IC surface modeling skills. IC is already easier. The people I typically clash with in regards to CAD programs are Pro-E enthusiasts who make ridiculous assumptions about what IC can and cant do. My response to them is always the same, Pro-E started from the bottom like everybody else! Then I get out my laptop and show them it can. Let me explain why I do this and why it should be a welcomed comparison. In the mean time, I hope I dont offend anyone. Surely, the IC enthusiasts understand and can appreciate that these open forums are in place so that IC can gain further input for its SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis. For these reasons alone, I feel it should be a duty for us all to challenge IC, to let them know what others are doing and to let them know what we like about those other programs. Be bold and name the programs specifically. There should be no need for covert and around-the-block generalizations of what you may have seen. It is as if we are IronCad Beta testers, and quite frankly, I dont mind because I want to see IC rise to the top. As you may have concluded for yourself, the barriers to entry for CAD programs are either very low or virtually nonexistent. It seems as if a new company is born every month! I must admit that some of them have really good insight. I have no regrets or reservations about investigating different CAD programs. I love CAD programs; they make my job easy and very fun. With the sudden onslaught of new programs, it is hard to keep up. I have used IronCad since version 2.0, and many of you out there have mentioned showing your loyalty for much longer; trispectives, I think some have called it. I am in your corner, IronCad, until the end. Together, along with many others, I will infiltrate and research other programs for as long as I can get to them and make visits to

See what I mean ?.. IC guys rock !... BAM !... Finished.... or atleast 933% of it.... HAAA !

AHHHH ... Yes... that is a very good idea.

I also noticed that for some reason I can't attach a smart dimension on the relulting solid after a surface trim. The smart dimension is just x'ed out. Hmmmmm.

When using surfaces to trim or subtracting from a solid block, it looks at though some of your surface sections need to be closed sections and others don't. Is this supposed to work like this? Maybe that is the problem with trimming surfaces with other surfaces...I would think that you should be able to trim surfaces with another surface regardless of whether or not you are using an open profile or section. I thought the direction of the arrow controlled the side that will or rather will NOT be trimmed ?...

For some reason I have been unable to get the trimming direction to work correctly despite the direction of the arrows. I am trying to get an enclosed volume from the 3 surfaces. Whenever I try to get the upper curved surface to cut the center tube... it always seems to blow away the wrong half.... no matter what direction I make the arrow. I even tried subtracting from the solid block (check the scene browser)... I am still getting unexpected results... still getting the wrong halves. Any help? surface stuff.ics

Never mind... wrong units in the setup... not use to metric

How about this... I just made a smalll sheetmetal part in an older file.. Copy and paste in the same file works fine... When I paste the same sheetmetal part in a new file (created after loading 6.2 update)... the scale is all wrong... size increase by 100% !

Hey... just pasted the same book shelf in a file Pre-6.2 update and it came in the correct size ! WHAT ??

Ok... just got my computer back and I just loaded the 6.0.2 update per the instructions on the site... So excuse me if I am a little behind. I have one file... a bookshelf... I selected all the parts and selected the "assemble" tool. Then I made a copy of the assembly. I pasted it into another scene... and BAM!.. The size scale is through the roof ! Try making a bookshelf 2000 inches long and 5000 inches high! This never happened before. Any explanations? Is there another update?

Just an update. "I see the problem and am reporting it to the developers right now. Thanks for the report." Chris Lohman IronCAD

OOOHHH YEAH !... its going crazy now ! Got a bearing in the assembly and sometimes it only sections the rollers and other times just the inner and outer races. Even a few instances where the section doesn't show at all !!... In some instances you can't even place it on any of the pick points, but if you go ahead and hit the "ok" (green light) , it shows up in the scene browser but not in the scene !!...or sometimes they show up be at some random location across the assembly. Heres a good one, One time I simply rotated the part (dynamic rotation), and things would "move" as if they were part of an exploded view. Don't even try to turn on the "precise mode"... BAM !... error messages !! Model inconsistency errors?... all kinds of stuff just before it kicks you out ! Local bug on my computer? Maybe it's getting sleepy, which means as soon as Chris gets it, everything will work fine. Chris... the file name is "assembly section". There are 2 assemblies in the file... try them both. One has the assembly section on precise mode and the other with precise mode and hidden. Remember, try the add and remove menue in the scene (by selecting the face on the part, right click etc) vs the scene browser and hidden vs "showing" section tools... In each case, they do things differently.

I will send the file tonight.