AutoCAD Inventor :: Translucent Parts In Appearance
Nov 12, 2013
In Inventor LT, it would be very useful if some of my parts were translucent in appearance. I have changed the "feature appearance" of the extrusion to Polycarbonate Clear" but it's still at the default grey.
I have just recently upgraded to 2013.I have one color in particular that use dto be grey - now it is red. I have repaired the appearance so it looks correct in a part. I was able to save this backto the library, overwriting the original. This is all good. I am unable to find out how to push this updated appearance to all parts in an assembly. I used to be able to do this with the update styles tool.
I have an assembly (A) that has a subassembly (B) that has a pattern of subassemblies (C's) that consist of many parts (D, E, F, G & H). The parts (DEFGH) are steel and have their own drawings. They do and should look like steel.
They are welded together as an assembly (C). This will be painted bright yellow. I wish to assign a yellow appearance to the subassembly, not affecting the parts. Last, when I open the upper assemblies (A or B), I expect C to have the painted color. I cannot make this work in Inventor 2013.
I can assign appearances to parts DEFGH. No error there. I can NOT assign appearances to assemblies (C). The only thing I see in the Appearance box is "Favourites" and "Inventor Material Library".
I can individuall select and highlight parts DEFGH inside the assembly C and assign an appearance to them. Sort of a work-around, but...
...this is not carried through to upper assemblies (A or B). If I just open them, all items are steel-colored, not yellow. If choose to edit one of the patterned C's inside B, only that instance is colored. None of the others in the pattern.
I must thus expand every instance in the pattern and highlight every part and set an appearance. But this is still not carried through to A. Or any of several other assemblies that also contain B.
Thus, if I want a persistent coloring, I either have to "paint" the individual parts, or I will have to scour up each and every assembly and "paint" every part inside them.
Is there really no way to assign an appearance to an assembly and have it carried through automatically to all assemblies that contain it? Like in every other solid modeler I have ever used?
We use different types of sheet metals, from stainless to bronze, and different thicknesses.
Currently, in order to show the correct material on a parts list, I have to duplicate the material Stainless Steel, and rename it to say 20 Gauge Stainless Steel. Then again for 16 Ga, 14Ga, 12 Ga, etc...
I'd like to have the parts list show the common material such as "Stainless Steel", with another column for the sheet metal style such as "20 Gauge."
We also use items such as Plastic Laminate. I'd like to create a generic material for the physical properties of "Plastic Laminate", and then change the material appearance to say "Formica #1234 Walnut". Again, i'd like to be able to put this in (2) columns on the parts list.
I have an interesting question here - How should I try to shaded render this syringe so that a plunger can be seen underneath the translucent body? I need to have the gradiations and labels of the millileters be plainly black.
OR
is there a way to keep those gradations black while rendering an illustration and have the plunger visible beneath the body?
The gradiations are cut into the body of the syringe in this model, and the surfaces of the gradiations are changed to black.
Have been adjusting the color styles - but perhaps I'm missing something. Making the material translucent just fades the gradiations on the syringe, I'd like.
I am trying to replace a custom part - created from a content center part - with a copied part with a different name. (I am using the replace tool in an assembly.) However, Inventor is not replacing the part with the part I pick but rather the content center version of it.
On the main sheet of my drawing I have the overall Parts List. Shows almost all parts except for the few that we don't want to list. On the second sheet I inserted a Parts List to show only parts that are shown in a detail on that page, made the rest non-visible.
On the main sheet there is an item (#13) that has a QTY of 3. Two of those Three are optional parts. What I'm trying to do is insert a custom part into the Parts List, give it an item number of 13A and put in the description "OPTIONAL", then do an Override in the balloon to show 13A.
I get it in the Parts List, Apply it, close it, save the drawing. Looking at the Parts List, item #13A is there, but item #14 is gone. I go back into the Parts List and 13A is there and there's a blue box around the item # and the description. I uncheck Static Value and number 14 shows up (item # and the description).
Then I go over to sheet two, open that Parts List and it lists 13A at the bottom with all the info I added in sheet one and it's non-visible. Go back to sheet one, open the Parts List and there is no 13A to be found.
I am working on an assembly that is designed around a box (bounding box) that could change size. I modeled the bounding box and placed it in a new assembly file. All other parts have been created within the assembly by referencing that bounding box with starting work plane and project geometry.
The problem comes in when I change the bounding box dimensions. The work planes for each additional part, which were defined by the faces of the bounding box, do not move when the sides move. Also, my projected geometry is not updating correctly. This is a simple box, with all 90° corners. So, all associated parts (at this point) are just rectangles.
My parts list on my idw do not update when I make changes to the model. Specifically, I have deleted a bolted connection on my design and replaced with a different components but the parts list table does not update - all I see is a lightning bolt in the browser next to the parts list but I cannot update it here.
Autodesk Inventor Professional 2013 SP2 64-Bit Edition Windows 7 HP Z400, Intel Xeon W3550 3.07GHz 12.0GB RAM, ATI FirePro V4800 (FireGL)
I was using virtual parts to add nuts and bolts to a drawing in 2013
I can make a VP bolt in the assembly, no problem, set it's size, weight, etc.
In the VP itself, there is no option for number of bolts I want it to emulate. For arguement's sake the weight was 1 pound per bolt (they are big bolts).
I can go into the BOM and say quantity 60, hit done and save the assembly.
If i open the drawing, the parts lists shows 60lbs for the 60 bolts total - which it should when summing the weight.
The problem is the BOM/assembly. If the weight of my assembly (without bolts) is 10,000lbs, the assembly sees the VP weighing 1lb and says the total weight is 10,001 lbs. Am i going to have to pattern a fake part to get this to work right? Shouldn't the total weight take into account the quantity set in the Bom??
Is there a way to display the density of materials that are assigned to varius parts in the parts list on a drawing? I don't need the mass of the parts I just need the material density to show up next to their respective parts.
For example, if I have a part with [steel mild] material assinged to it (no matter the size) I need a column in the BOM on the drawing to show: 490.684 lbs/ft^3. "Worry when there's something to worry about."
I have an assembly with a lot of purchased parts. I need to create a buy out list for purchasing. I've done this many times in the past and have a template set up for this purpose.
So now the problem, In this assembly, I have subassemblies showing up on my parts only parts list.
One of the subassemblies cinsists of two purchased parts. Both parts are set to purchased in the Bill of materials. If I do a parts only list on this assembly, it works as expected, showing two purchased parts. However, if I put that assembly into a higher level assembly, A parts only parts list shows the assembly instead of the individual parts.
I have a .idw that I'm trying to make a parts list on. I select parts list and highlight everything. There are two screws that are not showing up on the parts list. I cannot select them manually either. It's acting like they are not there. Even if I do a complete parts list (adding the assemblies parts into one big list), they still don't show up.
How can I select these parts? What is wrong with them that they do not show up in the parts list?
I have been working with an assembly today where it is ideal to mirror parts and have figured out how to reuse the parts rather than create new parts. Now I find that when the parts are mirrored, they ate not retaining the mates. Where do I find the setting so they either retain their mates, or prefferably retain the mirror so that if I move the origional, the mirror moves as well?
Is it possible to add a Appearance tab to a Ipart table? I am cataloging a set of parts and one part is made with steel but in Gloss - Black and Matte - Black and i'd like to differentiate the 2 without haveing to make 2 seperate Ipart files.
I'm having trouble finding or creating an 'appearance' that actually looks like glass. Each of the appearances in the Inventor library and Autodesk libraries are milky and not very transparent at all. I'd like to find or create a material that is almost 100% clear, but reflects the environment.
The transparency slider scales from 0-100% but the results are more like 0-75%.Inventor Studio looks just as bad.I've got to believe that it's not impossible to do without Showcase or 3DS Max.
I created a host of materials with a certain appearance etc and saved them as a library. When I open my Inventor 2013 this morning I seemed to have lost my appearances. It says my materials are missing the Appearance asset - see attached screenshot.
I've been attempting to create a sphere with an Earth texture, for which I've made a custom appearance with a flattened picture of earth. Instead of wrapping to the sphere, however, the image is mirrored on both sides of the sphere and extremely distorted. I knew wrapping 2D geometry to a sphere was not strictly possible, but is there no way to pull it off with an image?
If not, would something like this be possible in 3DS max?
I am clearing an override of a part in a subassembly. I tried to use the clear appearance button but I get message saying Active Design View has no appearance overrides which is not true. You can see in my attachment there clearly is an override from Chrome-Polished in the IPT to Satin- Brushed in the IAM.
There is no "Clear Override" in the Appearance pull down. I think I used to be able to click on color As Part in previous Inventor version but now it's different. The black areas are embossed features representing silkscreened graphics I need to preserve.
I tried to post the files in Inventor/Customer Files NG but the "new message" button was grayed out & not working.
I have an xml file with RAL colors I used befor the new appearance was added in Inventor. Now I want to use ral colors in Inventor 2013 but that I can not manage. how I can add ral colors and also properly be given in my parts.
Just got upgraded to version 2013 by IT. Seeing that AD still can't maintain consistency from vers to vers. This version replaced 'Color Styles" with 'Appearances'. But, not just appearances, you have Document Appearances, the Autodesk Material Libray, the Autodesk Appearance Library, and the Inventor Material Library.
Why would the Material libraries show up when clicking the Appearances button when there is another button right beside it to get to Materials.
I mean, who is really going to use several dozen different types of flooring. And why is some metal in the metal category and some in default Category. And then some is in the metal Type and some in the generic Type. Is there really a need for two fields for organizing 'appearances' ? If this were a graphical design program I couls see some of this but it is a cad program. Seems like a case of trying to tailor one product to too many markets.
To the question. How do I unlock the Autodesk Appearance Library so I can get rid of all the junk I don't need and add some really obvious ones that are not there.
In 2012 (and earlier) you rotated the texture in Style Editor. This was limited vs the new method.
I have parts with lots of faces and need to rotate all the faces at the same time, like 2012.
Also, I need the changes to be updated in all iparts, whereas at the moment the Adjust only seems to affect each one. Again, much less limited, but I need the option to update all at once too.
I have problems with material appearance in the frame generator. I have created a new material 316 stainless steel and assigned a specific colour to it. I have now decided to change that colour but it only changes when I change the material in iProperties of the part. I still get the old colour when I use the frame generator to change the material. The only way to change the colour of my material is thru the appearance tab in the frame generator pop up window.
how to change the the appearance of indivitual copied object when using the pattern tool. I can change the appearance on the original object (which is red on the picture) but im having problem changing the the appearance of the other objects ( i want all of them to have different colors)
Basically i have created a good size IAM and now need to lighten all of the appearances up. Can i change them in the i am and have it update the individual IPT files at the same time? or will i have to open all the ipt files and change it and save?