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parts disappearing from drawing

Question asked by Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017
Latest reply on Feb 23, 2018 by Milo Wilhite

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this is a bit of a first for me. I have an electrical panel assembly full of components and when I move that in to a drawing most (but not all) of the components disappear! You can still wander around the drawing and pickup on their edges but they are not visibly there. Perhaps even more interesting is I may see parts of an assembly (eg a DB connector) but then not the assembly it is a part of!

I did manage to find this thread https://forum.solidworks.com/message/514813?q=parts%20disappearing and tried the CTRL-Q but it did not work. I've also tried creating a new drawing, copy/pasting sheets, rebuilding, rebooting, etc. I am really at a loss for this one. Interestingly enough there are no other drawings in this project I am having issues with - I have used many of these same parts in drawings previously and not had issues.

here is a link to the pack-and-go (44mb) https://files.viengineering.com/url/3mdythcy269vnktk

here are screen shots of the assembly and drawing:

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John Stoltzfus Jun 22, 2017 10:58 AM
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Try this -

Change the Display Style to Hidden Lines Visible and then back to Hidden Lines Removed
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Mike Young @ John Stoltzfus on Jun 22, 2017 11:10 AM
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that didn't work; however, it may have gotten a bit more interesting!

if I go to "wire frame" everything shows up as it should (sorta, top view looks a bit funky). Switching back everything disappears as it was.

if I go to "shaded with edges" - everything shows up as well

switch back from this - GONE AGAIN!
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John Stoltzfus @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 11:21 AM
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You mentioned "Wire Frame & Shaded" - did you try it with Hidden Lines Shown??
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Mike Young @ John Stoltzfus on Jun 22, 2017 11:29 AM
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yes. on both 'hidden lines removed' and 'hidden lines visible' the parts are not there. they do show up in every other display type.

did you try and download these files, did changing display types for you fix it?
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Steve Calvert @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 12:21 PM
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Try saving the drawing with one display state showing the components and then close the drawing and open it back up and then change the display state back to what you want and see what happens.

Steve C
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Mike Young @ Steve Calvert on Jun 22, 2017 1:34 PM
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good news and bad news.

sure enough this did work. but as soon as I attempt to save the drawing or even work in it, it updates and everything disappears again.
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Dan Pihlaja @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 1:48 PM
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Did you try loading the drawing lightweight?
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Mike Young @ Dan Pihlaja on Jun 22, 2017 2:05 PM
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did just now - no results
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Dan Pihlaja @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 2:14 PM
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Can you share the drawing/assembly and some of us can try it on our end to see if we get the same result?
Never mind...I just saw the link that you put in the first post.

You are using a newer version than I am.

What version of SW are you using?
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Mike Young @ Dan Pihlaja on Jun 22, 2017 2:15 PM
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in the first message there is a link to a file cloud download, 44mb ZIP file. I am currently using SW 2016 SP5.0

I appreciate the effort here guys this is a new one for me!
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Dan Pihlaja @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 2:17 PM
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I edited my reply.....I am a no go. Maybe someone else can download and try it out.

If no one bites....try sending it to your VAR.
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Carmen Brown Jun 22, 2017 2:18 PM
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I read once about a similar sort of problem of "disappearing parts". It was related to a SW device known as the bounding box.
Not sure if that is related, but if nothing else works, perhaps look into resetting the bounding box. There's a post somewhere on how to do it >>> My SOLIDWORKS Assembly Disappeared!
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Jim Steinmeyer @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 2:52 PM
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Is there any chance that you are using envelopes? I had something similar happen and as i recall envelopes were involved. Let me look a bit.
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Jim Steinmeyer @ Jim Steinmeyer on Jun 22, 2017 2:59 PM
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Just tried it. This is wild, I opened properties, selected show envelope and everything showed great in all views. Then as I was opening this thread to reply......off they went again. Strange, but this is where I would get the VAR involved as there surely is something wrong here. I changed the properties back and everything showed again until it had fully rebuilt again, then poof it's gone again.
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Mike Young @ Jim Steinmeyer on Jun 22, 2017 3:11 PM
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well this makes me feel a little better

I've contacted my VAR with this issue and have linked to this thread. I will keep you all updated with whatever findings and solution we arrive at.

thanks again everyone for your time and suggestions.
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Dennis Schuette Jun 22, 2017 3:33 PM
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Have you made sure this box wasn't checked in your settings?
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Jim Steinmeyer @ Dennis Schuette on Jun 22, 2017 3:39 PM
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Not checked in my case, and since it is a system option, if that had been the case it would have behaved different on my machine anyway. That is an interesting option, why would a person want to hide components when the view was created?
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Mike Young @ Dennis Schuette on Jun 22, 2017 3:42 PM
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not checked here. did not know that was an option.

also - wouldn't that hide all of the components and not just some, as in this case? Another thing to consider is it shows the DB connectors on that top row of parts (those parts are assemblies) but it does not show the other components.
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Vladimir Urazhdin @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 3:46 PM
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I tried your files with SW 2017 SP 1. Everything looks exactly the way you have described and nothing helps.
Sure the case is deserved to be reported to SW.
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Dennis Schuette Jun 22, 2017 3:59 PM
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I think it worked for me...
I am not missing any of the components that I can tell. I am running 2015 SP5 so it came in a a "future version" model but looks to be fine.
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Mike Young @ Dennis Schuette on Jun 22, 2017 4:05 PM
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the top row components still have some issues - but without question it's better looking than mine.

have you tried everything listed so far in this thread to see if there are any changes?
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Dennis Schuette @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 4:39 PM
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Those items in the top row don't even show up in my model so that would be why they are missing on my drawing.
I didn't try everything because mine looked as complete as what was in the model I downloaded.
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Mike Young Jun 22, 2017 4:59 PM
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Okay everyone I got in contact with my VAR and here is the solution we arrived at:

first thing we updated was my system settings, changed both of those to draft quality.

next thing we re-imported the assembly, in draft quality, and everything seems to show up.

by checking the boxes in the system setting it allows you to have the option for "draft" or "high" quality in the display style for the drawing view.

what I'm told is that one, or more, of these parts/assemblies has conflicting display settings at a part level. Only a few of these parts are "new to me" parts not used before in models so I suspect one of those could be the culprit.

I'm not a huge fan of this fix as I have made system level changes and all of my drawings are now "draft" quality by default; however, I can hobble along through this for the next few days and hope this doesn't become a more regular occurrence.

glad you could all join me on this journey. one last time thank you all again for your time and assistance and thanks to my VAR for quickly getting me through this.
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Ned Hutchinson @ Mike Young on Jun 22, 2017 7:08 PM
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Hi Mike i was just looking for something like this thread yesterday cause was having same problem.
2015 SP5
Drawing would show up when you change them to wireframe, shaded or shaded with edges.
But then would dissapear when you changed to hidden lines removed or hidden lines visible.
And looking at my pictures i do have it set to high quality on hidden lines visible which may be why they dissapeared.
My fix was to reboot computer and thankfully they worked again.
Ill try to remember the high quality for next time i see this happen
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Mike Young Jul 12, 2017 11:38 AM
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I thought I might update everyone on the actual solution to this particular problem. I went back to my VAR and my understanding is this was escalated to "SolidWorks" support.

what I had always struggled with was - I had used all of these parts/models before - except one or two. I started to dig in to it further and found when I suppressed the linear pattern for the top row of components (WINFORD DB9 for those of you referencing the model) everything would work! So I had narrowed it down to something in that part file was causing the issue.

Sure enough there were some imported surfaces that seemingly caused the issue. In the assembly "WINFORD - BRK0MF-S-DIN (DB9 BREAKOUTBOARD).SLDASM" there is a part called "Straight Female Connector". In this part were three imported surfaces. Two of them did nothing and showed up as infinite center lines - those get deleted. Then I was instructed to do an import diagnostic to fix the remaining rebuild issues with that part. Then after that the problem would be solved and it was.

the bottom line is - there were two imported surfaces that seem to be the issue. I don't fully understand it but I thought I would let everyone know. Maybe just take a closer look at your parts, specifically if they are imported, and do some clean up if need be.
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