Last post on Inventor
was about authoring T&P clips and today I will cover just a bit about route
editing and tee branching.
After doing a
quick layout and pipe laying it become obvious that the filter in the image
bellow is too close to the building column. It needs to move left
but there is not enough room with the route in the current state. I need to
move the tee around the corner just before the discharge flange. I need to insert an elbow
between the by-pass tee and the one with the sample valve.
You could extend
the flange segment and insert the tee but you would then need to
disconnect/connect the sample valve as well and if you use component tagging
(my post here) you will have to tag them again. What we want is to move the
elbow along with the sample valve altogether around the corner.
First I will
disable the building so that it becomes un-selectable, transparent ghost like.
This will allow me to work around it and still visually see the impact of my
changes. Now I will modify my selection filter to part priority and double
click on the route end to start editing it.
The eeg (elbow + elbow
+ gap) dimension right before my tee needs to increase so that I can insert a
node without Inventor complaining about violating the minimum allowed distance.
Then I can insert
a node and remove the collinear constraint so that I can pull my segments just
about 90degrees before I constrain the route. Otherwise I might have the route
flipping in the wrong direction therefore I will pull it a bit so when
constrained it will solve a minimum move.
Now I can move the
filter and remove the extra node (new socket coupling) just before the flange.
Note: The filter here is placed and constrained at the top level assembly
but it’s been authored and it’s droppable as a T&P fitting.
So in order to
keep the fittings you need to keep the nodes in place. If I want to move the
filter and the by-pass route I will insert two nodes and delete the segment in
between them. Removing the segment without adding new nodes would delete the end fittings as well (my tee).
I use this lot and
it’s very good for when moving equipment. I usually insert nodes, brake routes
before moving equipment because the route goes into violation mode and it
becomes locked. At that point you can’t insert nodes, you can only delete
segments which will remove fittings at the nodes and you can only remove
constraints which is not helpful enough.
The last thing I’ll show you today is how to
add tees. In the image bellow I want to have a tee branch where the socket
coupling is. There are 3 ways of doing this:
1 – Inset the tee
at the top level assembly and constrain it. Connect your routes to it.
2 – Just like in
my image drop a tee on top of the coupling and start a new route from it.
3 – My favourite
method, especially when having same route size is to have one single route.
Because Inventor
doesn’t allow branches you can’t connect the line end points (3 lines or more)
but you can have the 3’rd line at a distance and fix it with dimensions and
constrains.
So how do you create a nother line especially when route
end points are conencted ? This is where you become creative and start routing
at any allowed geometry anywhere in space and remove the first segment and the
included geometry that Inventor adds when you start a new route segment. Then
you constraint those floating segments to your node at a distance constrained
in the T position.
When you finish
the route you just need to drop an elbow on top of the coupling or whatever
fitting you have specified in the style settings.
Maybe you were
using this methods already still, I hope you found it useful. Join me next time
when we’ll show you how to work with mixed route styles and how to align the 3D
Ortho Tool when it’s really skewed.
And the video:
Later,
ADS.
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