Replacing Assembly Components in CAD Made Easy

Did you get a chance to join PTC University and Creo Curriculum Manager, Matt Huybrecht for Session 1: Replacing Assembly Components in our Going Live with PTC University webinar series? If not, we’ve got you covered.

Check out these five key takeaways from Session 1 and make sure to register and attend the remainder of this FREE eight-part webinar series. We’ll meet you there!

1. Retain parent/child assembly relationships

You can easily retain parent/child relationships by using the Replace functionality, which instantly increases your productivity. Doing so automatically enables you to replace any component that is part of a family table with another instance of that family table. Replacing components by family table is a fast and easy way to swap components in and out of an assembly. This is a common method when working with standard hardware libraries that are often created with family tables.

2. Afterward, check on your children

When you replace a component, some children of the original component may not be able to reference the new component if its geometry is significantly different. For example, an instance of a family table may not have the same number of holes as the original instance. In this situation, after replacing the instance, you may need to edit the assembly definition to account for fewer holes.

3. Exchange components containing a Merge or Inheritance feature

You can use the Reference model to replace components as a fast and easy way to exchange components in and out of an assembly. It is common for cast part model geometry to be merged or inherited into the machined part model as a means of maintaining the proper geometry in the machined model. You can take advantage of this relationship by exchanging any model referencing the cast model in and out of the assembly.

4. Handle unrelated components

Replacing components using the Unrelated Component method is useful because it does not require the swapped components to have a predefined relationship, such as Reference Model, Family Table, Interchange Assembly, and so on. The Reference Pairing tool enables you to create that relationship to swap unrelated components and avoid redefining downstream assemblies, drawings, and other applications.

5. Create interchange assemblies

In the interchange assembly, you can predefine and save paired references that are used to assemble the components within design assemblies. Creating an interchange assembly is useful when you have a number of components that are frequently replaced with one another in many assemblies throughout your enterprise.

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