I am tasked with creating an automated way of generating some very simple rule based part models. It would be a very simple task except for that there are over 20,000 possible configurations. Of all those parts they can be broken down into 314 families. Each family has three main features that show up in multiple families: a base block, a mounting pattern, and a crucible. All other features are specific to the families.

What I am planning is to make part templates that contain the base block and all the possible sizes of that general base block. Each family then has usually 2 to 3 mounting pattern options which I built as library features with the configurations for the options. The crucible is another library feature that can be dropped onto the part and has 9 configurations all of which are used in every family.

Next I add in all the family specific features and create a design table to drive the sizes with. Everything works perfectly except I can't change the crucible or mounting pattern in the design table so the whole process is useless. As a really bad work around I could insert the library feature for the mounting pattern 3 times each with a different configuration, and the crucible 9 times each with a different configuration and suppress all but the one that I want to use of each for every part. But this is very time consuming and adds a lot of confusion to the model and risk of something going wrong.

Does anyone know what the code is to control a library feature from the design table. Or can anyone offer a better way of doing this. Basically my goal is to have each family be a model with the block, mounting pattern, and crucible linked as children back the the design library features so if there are changes to the mating parts I can edit one file and have it tell me every design that needs to be checked to make sure the change will not effect the way any of these parts works.