I am fairly new to design tables. I understand how they work and I know how to add parameters by double clicking on the dimension. I have a DT driving an assembly with about 10 simple parts in it. I would like to add the weights of the parts that are of the same material together so I can get weight totals by material. Since the weight of a part does not show up as a dimension that you can click on, I have to add it to the table manually. The help says to use "$sw-mass". I understand this will work in a part but I am in an assembly. Wouldn't the proper name be "$sw-mass@partname"? I tried that and it said my column heading had an invalid feature name. I don't want the mass of a feature I want the mass of a part. As a test I made a simple square part, assigned it a material, and inserted an autogenerated DT. I entered a parameter called "$sw-mass" and the cell below it stayed blank. Shouldn't the mass have showed up? What is the correct way to get a part's weight into a DT? Thanks.
OK, I don't know what I did but my single test part works now. "$sw-mass" is correct, now I just need to figure out how to get that working for parts within an assembly. The proper syntax seems to be "$sw-mass@partname<1>" The 1 after the part name is that part's instance in the assembly. When I used this name it no longer gives me an error about my column heading, but the mass does not show up either. Thanks.