Today I am going
to show you how to use the clone tool on the mExtension toolbar. This is a
really powerful function that allows you to do project variations in minutes.
One way to use the
function would be to clone a part inside an assembly (that is a local cloning)
and the other way would be to clone assemblies (useful for project variations).
I
will start with local cloning and show you how to change one part in an
assembly wich contains multiple instances of the same part.
Once
again I have opened my assembly and I will clone and change one side wall from
the stainless steel frame. The part I want to change is reused 3 times more
inside the assembly and as you can see inside the working space I have a
drawing for it as well.
Select
the component you want to clone and click on clone on the mExtension toolbar. I
know that the next available number is 14 so I am going to use it in the save
as dialog. You could use any temporary name and then use the rename function on
the mExtension toolbar. Click save and check the message window. It asks us if
we want to replace the selected component with the new clone. After clicking
yes the part iproperties pups-up so we can change the properties for the new
clone. I will change the part number and the revision number and click ok.
Now
let’s make a rectangular cut on the wall and return to the assembly. As you can
see only the clone has the cut in while the rest remained the same. Unfortunately
Inventor hasn’t updated the name for the clone in the browser so we will use
the rename browser nodes from mExtension to update it. I want the model to be shown as “Part number
– Description”, so click apply and watch the change.
Let’s
open the drawing for the clone and also open the drawing of the original part
to verify the changes. As you can see the drawing of the clone has an updated
part number and it also has the new cut on the main view
The
second way of using the clone function will be to clone a whole subassembly and
I will do it to make a project variation. I will make a new project with a
bigger tank, in under a minute.
Select
the tank walls in the browser or in the graphical window along with the rest of
the assemblies in the structure containing these parts and along with the main
project assembly. So basically you select the components that change and all
the upper structure files affected by them changing. Use clone on the mExtension and select a new
folder for the save location. I have
already created my new project folder but you can create one in the save as
dialog window. After clicking apply a new window appears where you can review
the files to clone and change properties for the new files.
We
can change the new file name, description and part number for the selected
files and if you want others to be cloned as well you will need to mark the
tick box before column name changing them from a grey out look to a normal one.
I
will do a search replace to get rid of “ Copy” at the end of each file and I
will use the replace again to change project number. Do the same on part number
or just copy the file name to part number.
As
you can see in my new folder I have all selected files to be cloned along with
their drawings. The rest of the files are reused.
I will change my
project to the newly created one and open the main assembly. As you can see Inventor didn’t updated the
browser names and I will use the “Rename Browser Nodes” on mExtension to fix
this. I will use “Part number – Description” as my default browser name.
I am going to
increase the height of the tank by 50 mm and then update the drawings. All I
have to do is reposition the views to fit the drawing again and I am ready to
go. Because the drawing is linked with the model I could have changed the
dimensions from the drawing. So now I have a new product ready for fabrication
in a matter of minutes.
I hope you see the
power of this function and maybe you will share your best practices on it with
us in a comment bellow.
ADS
And the video:
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