Just a quick question on fixing those errors that pop up during file import. What is the best way to fix them?
I find a lot of radiused corners end up wrong or completely missing.
What is the best (and easiest) way to fix this? I've had only mixed success with the import diagnostics. Some of those corners it keeps telling me there's a failing face, which I can't seem to delete. Face delete/patch doesn't seem to work.
try to save as parasoild and then open it again and sometimes it gets fixed. or have your customer send a couple of different export options and try those.
other wise you'll need to delete faces and rebuild them.
from the pic, can you hover over those faces and they look like they are there? Is the file a surface body or a solid body?
This part started life as a DXF/DWG. It imports surfaces and if those surfaces close then it becomes a solid. If I can patch this one I can also form a solid but I'm not having any luck doing so.
Import diagnostics tells me there's a failing face on those corners, yet I cannot delete that failing face.
We routinely convert files from AutoCAD solids/ surface bodies to SW. We find it is often faster and less headache to just put the part into an assembly file, place a new part into the assembly and remodel it in context. This creates a more robust, editable model and is often quicker than struggling with an imported body- especially if there are a lot of fillets and chamfers in the imported part.
why are you using Acad? sounds like alot of back and forth monkey farting around? and why aren't you exporting iges, step, sat or parasolids out of Acad for surfaces...dwg/dxf isn't really the best ones.
As John has said, this is what we get sent, this is all we have to work with. I can request IGES all day long, I'm never going to get it.
Remodelling is not an option, I can't put this whole file up for IP reasons but I might be able to pare out the gearbox case in the picture and upload that later.
The majority of work done worldwide still seems to be autocad based. Not even inventor, just a 2D program that now does 3D badly.
I guess there's no magic bullet for fixing these faces then?
Dougal,
I'm giving a presentation at SolidWorks World this year on importing and repairing models. Do you mind if I could have a look at your model under NDA? If so email me at mark.biasotti@3ds.com
Regards
Mark
Hi Mark
I don't own this model and it's unlikely I'd ever be given permission to share it (it's a whole plant layout, several hundred metres of structures), but I have a multitude of other imported parts with issues. These range from individual parts to larger assemblies.
What size (number of components) model would you like?
An ideal part and one free from any IP issues would be a pillow block bearing assembly downloaded from SKF, used in autocad and exported into solidworks. Those can get really messy and have a decent number of parts in a comparatively small area.
Anything you can send me that you deem an "interesting" problem you can email me directly at mark.biasotti@3ds.com If the file/s is large, I can set up a FTP transfer.
Regards
Mark
Hi Mark
Here are the bearing examples I'll be emailling you shortly. I've got one that imported almost perfectly and another that shows a typical failure.
Roland, yes deleting those faces and manually fixing them is the goal. But they won't delete and I don't know the best method to create a new face to fill the gap.
Imported fillets can be problematic. It can take a lot more time to beat them into shape than to just redo them. If the fillets are simple enough to replicate, remove them using "Delete face" (or other means) and just redo them. If you don't care to have those extra features, lobotomize the solid by exporting and reimporting.
Okay, here is a nice simple model showing most of the import problems.
It's an ADT (articulated dump truck) model created in sketchup, converted to DXF in Rhino and imported into solidworks.
It has come through completely as surfaces, some are missing, some are a little bit wrong. But it's a nice small model that's easy to see what should be happening. It's solidworks 2009 format so most people should be able to open it and have a play.
What are the different options for converting these surfaces into solids and what is the best way?
The scale is also wrong, but that's easy to fix. Import it as metres and scale it by 0.75 to make it correct.
