Family table of special profiles

[slawek456]

Hello,


I try to do something what seems to be simple but I have no idea how to do it - I use WF4.0 FAP


I want to create part with family table of available hot roled steel H or C sections which would be stored in read-only library. That is not difficult but using that part is not such. In steel structures you need to use the sections withdiferent size,length, holes, cutouts etc. what forces to savesuch file. Of course it is possible to copy this library file to working directory, make changes and rename it as well as family table instances but ... I wonder if it is possible to have a file with sketched curve of such C sections together with family table of its different sizes and when needed create new empty part, make reference to that sketched curve file, select size from family table (with possibility to change that size later), make extrusion, cut-outs, holes ... but how to do it?


Idea could be extended to special aluminium profiles which in case of big assemblyof the same profiles but different lengths would give easy update of all profiles by change of one section file...


I was trying with UDF's which seems to be best solution (gives possibility to change section size during design and not to loose cut outs references) but a little complicated usage for such purpose and I found difficulties with updating parameters stored in UDF's family table.


Creating library of separate sketches for every section size would be time consuming and would give no possibility to change its size during part design.


How have you solved such problem - I'm sure I'm not the first one who faced with it. Any ideas will be very welcome.


Slawek

 

[brent.drysdale]

Hi Slawek,
I would say you have identified two key things.
One is that UDF is probably the right way to go for the sort of variation you want for each actual part
Two is that UDFs have been very hard to use if you don't use them much. UDF ease of use has only really improved with WF5. If you are stuck on WF4 this does not help much.

I could be on dodgy ground here sand don't have time to check it out so please be kind if it is a dead end. There may be another alternative which could(?) work for you. Inheritance features work in some ways like Family Tables but with less headaches for the type of part variation you want. The way I am thinking of this is that you have one master extruded shape (Sketch) and that you can have FT or direct parameters to give the size variations for the shape. You then make a new part and bring in this master part (shape profile) and have it not linked back to the original. I am hoping here that you can change the profile and use it to create an extrusion of the length you want and add holes etc as you want. It would be a stand alone part. In any case if it was me I would try more on UDF first.