I found the reason of losing all virtual parts in my assemblies. It is Pack&Go command. After it, all virtual parts are lost in both assemblies, they become greyed out in feature tree after reopening of assembly. When I try to open virtual part I get the following message.
Hi, Is it possible to share your assembly or that part?
What is that part? Is it generated from toolbox?
Nothing to share because the virtual part is lost. I don`t use Toolbox.
Repeat my steps:
1. Create assembly
2. Run command: "Insert Component->New part->Esc"
4. Run command: "Edit part" -> Create any feature on any plane (boss for example)
5. Save assembly on disk.
6. Run command: Pack&Go
7. Close assembly
8. Open original or packed assembly
no such problem on my machine (SW2016 sp2) tried few times, and even did pack and go, then opened inserted even more part and converted to internal component and did another pack&go. all works fine on my end.
I did do pack&go as zip files
Thank you for the information, I`ll try to find the reason, it is old problem for me.
can not find file.
Is it in the folder where the file should be? Is it deleted?
edit:
copy the virtual part to the folder where the assembly file is located and try it out.
Omur, part is virtual, so I can`t copy it to another folder. According to SW doc virtual parts are in assembly file but it is not true for some reason for some period of time. As you can see SW shows some Temp folder
If I save virtual part on disk everything is ok. I attached the file of my assembly.
There is nearly the same issue here virtual components missing in solidworks 2017 but show up in solidworks 2016
there is no definite explanation.
Virtual Parts Disappear in Assembly | MySolidWorks
edit:
I am trying
this error is not happening.
zip and assembly
Jul 20, 2018 8:59 AM
Hi all,
If you are encountering this problem it's important you report it to your reseller for investigation. It sounds that the following SPR likely covers the problem, but your reseller can verify this by working with our Tech Support team.
SPR 1018568: Systems - Pack and Go: Some virtual components in Pack and Go are losing file references (suppressed).
Thank you, Nick. I made names of part and assembly shorter to see the path to virtual part:
On another machine everything is OK.
Nick Birkett-Smith wrote:
Hi all,
If you are encountering this problem it's important you report it to your reseller for investigation. It sounds that the following SPR likely covers the problem, but your reseller can verify this by working with our Tech Support team.
SPR 1018568: Systems - Pack and Go: Some virtual components in Pack and Go are losing file references (suppressed).
Just encountered this problem helping a customer. Thanks for the SPR number.
Are there any updates or Hot-Fixes for this issues? Any possible workarounds? This issue has left me dead in the water and i will have to downgrade to 2017 if I cannot find a resolution.
Ethan, I met this bug on SW 2017 and I didn`t meet this bug on another computer with SW2018, so let`s wait. You can save all your virtual parts on disk before Pack&Go operation and return them back after that, if you need.
Well, I've found a possible work around. If i do the pack and go. Then immediately close solidworks. The new file will work. In fact if i re-name the new file, it also works. I'm going to experiment with these work arounds a little bit and see if they are reliant / consistent, then i will wrap them into my macros.
A possible Workaround could be to rename the Virtual Components before doing Pack&Go. Do not use capital letters, spaces or other Special characters.
Also helpful could be to close the SolidWorks session before P&G and start it from Context menu of Windows Explorer. Good Luck
I`ve got SW2018 sp5 list of closed SPRs just now and...
I hope this theme is closed because of SPR 1084157 (Pack and Go, Virtual Components: The Virtual Components in assembly lose reference after Pack and Go with the following message 'Cannot locate the file for the component to complete the operation') is closed by this service pack, though there is no information about SPR 1018568.
Igor Fomenko wrote:
I`ve got SW2018 sp5 list of closed SPRs just now and...
I hope this theme is closed because of SPR 1084157 (Pack and Go, Virtual Components: The Virtual Components in assembly lose reference after Pack and Go with the following message 'Cannot locate the file for the component to complete the operation') is closed by this service pack, though there is no information about SPR 1018568.
I don't know your problem is solved or not. But the following may help.
We are a fun of virtual parts and more than 90 percent of our components within assemblies are virtual.
I have had this problem for quite a long time (maybe from 3,4 years ago). But I've learned that it's not a SW side problem, but windows side.
Whenever I get this problem, I close the assembly without saving it to keep it intact, close solidworks and any other running app, Go to temp folder and delete everything there.
Now if I open the assembly everything is perfect and all the virtual parts that were missing or loosing their references are just fine.
For me, it has always been a loaded and full temp folder. and cleaning the temp folder has always been working.
I hope it works for you too.
Maybe the next time you have this problem, you want to give it a try.
PS: It mostly happens for me when I have too many virtual parts in an assembly, After a pack & go, or I close and open the same assembly several time continuously, I believe each time SW extracts the virtual parts to a folder in temp file, and then loose the trace to the files because of a heavy or large temp folder.
Many thanks for the information, I`ll keep it in my mind.
Just encountered this problem myself, and other engineers here have as well. I made the mistake of using Pack & Go with an assembly containing virtual assemblies. Fortunately, I got everything back, I think.
May this will work for you, maybe not. After updating an unrelated piece of software, something minor like Adobe Reader, I restarted my desktop PC (Windows 10). This simply fixed the problem. When I reopened my SW assembly, everything was back to normal. Note: closing SW and restarting the program is NOT enough (I tried that several times). I shut down and restarted my machine.
Sounds overly simple, I know. Try that and let me know if that fixes your issue.
