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Using a surface to cut, while in assembly?

Question asked by John Withers on Oct 22, 2011
Latest reply on Oct 23, 2011 by Scott McFadden

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Hi All,

I was wondering if someone can come up with a creative way for me to achieve this:

I am working on a part, that has three components perfectly lined up in an assembly. So far so good...

Now, I want to add another part, and I do, but this part, in order to align and "fit" perfectly it needs to have it's bottom cut with a surface, but this surface belongs to another part in the assembly. In other words, I want to use the assembly to "drive" this one part, and use the surface of a component in the assembly to make a cut...

Is this even feasible? Is there a creative way to do this in Solidworks? (I am at version 2011).

Any suggestions, i would greatly appreciate....

Thank you in advance....

John Withers Oct 23, 2011 8:28 AM

Correct Answer

THAT IS GENIOUS!!!

Doing this, it basically brings the surface to the current part you are editing, and since you are in edit mode, I now have ALL the commands for cutting with it!

Is this something which is documented, or is it one of those nice to know tricks?

Wow, it now makes me wonder how many other tricks like this exist...offeset of zero...wow! :-)

Mike, thank you so much! This is one of the coolest things I have seen so far in solidworks, and thank you very much for showing it to us!!

GENIOUS!

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Scott McFadden Oct 22, 2011 10:38 PM

John,

How about if you were to insert that one part into the other in part mode

and then do your cut there. Then insert that combination into the assembly.

Would that work?

If not how about some images to go along with your explanation.

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John Withers @ Scott McFadden on Oct 22, 2011 10:50 PM

Interesting...so if i was going to do that, how you I insert, while maintaining the allignment I am able to create in an assembly?

What exactly do you mean by "insert"...is there someway in part mode to allign two parts together like in assemblies?

Just trying to understand what you mean....

Thank you for your reply, appreciate it sir....

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Scott McFadden @ John Withers on Oct 23, 2011 10:57 PM

You obviously have your question answered and I am sorry for not getting back to you

sooner. What I meant is in part mode you can insert another part into and existing part (insert part under the insert pull down)

No you cannot have contraints between the two, but if you have planes and axis setup prior to inserting

it then it can appear to be constrained. But understand that in the feature manager the inserted part will not show any

features in the tree.

Hope this helps.

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Mike Price Oct 22, 2011 11:09 PM

Hi John,

What I would do if I was trying to get it accomplished in a quick manner would be the following:

While you are in your assy, edit the part itself that you want to cut. While you are editing the part, go to offset surface to create an offset surface that is at a distance of 0.00 (a zero offset surface) of the surface in the other part of the assy that you want to use to cut the part you are presently editing. If your assy had complex parts, you would simply open the part that you were editing to perform the cut with the offset surface you created while in the assy (that would only be necessary to speed things up, if necessary). If the assy is simple, you can do the cut with the zero offset surface while in the assy, without the speed and graphics causing you a problem.

Now the reason I made my first comment about trying to get it accomplished in a quick manner is because the steps above just created an in-context assy reference that could have some implications that are not desirable depending on what your are trying to do. However, this method sounds like it would be without issue with what you have described.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Mike

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John Withers @ Mike Price on Oct 23, 2011 8:28 AM

THAT IS GENIOUS!!!

Doing this, it basically brings the surface to the current part you are editing, and since you are in edit mode, I now have ALL the commands for cutting with it!

Is this something which is documented, or is it one of those nice to know tricks?

Wow, it now makes me wonder how many other tricks like this exist...offeset of zero...wow! :-)

Mike, thank you so much! This is one of the coolest things I have seen so far in solidworks, and thank you very much for showing it to us!!

GENIOUS!

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Mike Price @ John Withers on Oct 23, 2011 6:16 PM

Hi John,

I think it would be quite a stretch to classify this as "genious", especially when referring to some advice that I give.

A couple of things. I think that this is a pretty common practice and if I did a specific search, there are probably traces of this method all over this forum and also, you asked your question on a Saturday evening, not getting a lot of response whereas you would probably had a ton of responses along the same lines.

In fact, to familiar yourself for what would work best for you, you should try Scott's method as well. You'll get some more practice with the functionality and you may even prefer to use that method. And the answer to your question to him is yes you can use assembly type constraints to align up a part that you insert into another part.

Take care,

Mike

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6 Replies

Scott McFadden Oct 22, 2011 10:38 PM
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Correct Answer
John,
How about if you were to insert that one part into the other in part mode
and then do your cut there. Then insert that combination into the assembly.
Would that work?
If not how about some images to go along with your explanation.
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- John Withers @ Scott McFadden on Oct 22, 2011 10:50 PM
  Mark Correct
  Correct Answer
  Interesting...so if i was going to do that, how you I insert, while maintaining the allignment I am able to create in an assembly?
  
  What exactly do you mean by "insert"...is there someway in part mode to allign two parts together like in assemblies?
  
  Just trying to understand what you mean....
  
  Thank you for your reply, appreciate it sir....
  Like • Show 0 Likes0
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  - Scott McFadden @ John Withers on Oct 23, 2011 10:57 PM
    Mark Correct
    Correct Answer
    You obviously have your question answered and I am sorry for not getting back to you
    sooner. What I meant is in part mode you can insert another part into and existing part (insert part under the insert pull down)
    No you cannot have contraints between the two, but if you have planes and axis setup prior to inserting
    it then it can appear to be constrained. But understand that in the feature manager the inserted part will not show any
    features in the tree.
    Hope this helps.
    Like • Show 0 Likes0
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Mike Price Oct 22, 2011 11:09 PM
Mark Correct
Correct Answer
Hi John,

What I would do if I was trying to get it accomplished in a quick manner would be the following:

While you are in your assy, edit the part itself that you want to cut. While you are editing the part, go to offset surface to create an offset surface that is at a distance of 0.00 (a zero offset surface) of the surface in the other part of the assy that you want to use to cut the part you are presently editing. If your assy had complex parts, you would simply open the part that you were editing to perform the cut with the offset surface you created while in the assy (that would only be necessary to speed things up, if necessary). If the assy is simple, you can do the cut with the zero offset surface while in the assy, without the speed and graphics causing you a problem.

Now the reason I made my first comment about trying to get it accomplished in a quick manner is because the steps above just created an in-context assy reference that could have some implications that are not desirable depending on what your are trying to do. However, this method sounds like it would be without issue with what you have described.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Mike
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- John Withers @ Mike Price on Oct 23, 2011 8:28 AM
  Unmark Correct
  Correct Answer
  THAT IS GENIOUS!!!
  
  Doing this, it basically brings the surface to the current part you are editing, and since you are in edit mode, I now have ALL the commands for cutting with it!
  
  Is this something which is documented, or is it one of those nice to know tricks?
  
  Wow, it now makes me wonder how many other tricks like this exist...offeset of zero...wow! :-)
  
  Mike, thank you so much! This is one of the coolest things I have seen so far in solidworks, and thank you very much for showing it to us!!
  
  GENIOUS!
  Like • Show 0 Likes0
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  - Mike Price @ John Withers on Oct 23, 2011 6:16 PM
    Mark Correct
    Correct Answer
    Hi John,
    
    I think it would be quite a stretch to classify this as "genious", especially when referring to some advice that I give.
    
    A couple of things. I think that this is a pretty common practice and if I did a specific search, there are probably traces of this method all over this forum and also, you asked your question on a Saturday evening, not getting a lot of response whereas you would probably had a ton of responses along the same lines.
    
    In fact, to familiar yourself for what would work best for you, you should try Scott's method as well. You'll get some more practice with the functionality and you may even prefer to use that method. And the answer to your question to him is yes you can use assembly type constraints to align up a part that you insert into another part.
    
    Take care,
    
    Mike
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