Tips and tricks
From Inventor
Contents |
[edit] Sketches
[edit] Hide a sketch's dimensions, but not the geometry
Have you ever been working on a design with lots of sketches and before no time you could hardly see anything due to all the dimensions on each sketch? If so you might not have seen the option to turn off dimensions per sketch in the browser tree. In the browser select a sketch and right click on it (make sure you aren’t in the sketch mode) and you will see an option to turn off dimensions for that sketch.
I find this very useful when I am working on skeleton models and don’t want to see all the dimensions from my skeleton model.
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[edit] Models (.IPT)
[edit] Offset Sketch Plane
I often find it necessary to create a sketch that is offset from an existing face. This is usually a two step process by first creating a work plane then placing a sketch on the newly created work plane. There is a quick trick that will allow you create a work plane and sketch at the same time. Once you activate the sketch tool, move over an existing face to click and drag up or down. This will bring up the work plane offset dialog box and allow you to enter a value to create the work plane. Once you enter a value or dynamically drag to the right offset distance, select the checkbox. You will notice a new work plane was created and a sketch is active on the newly created plane.
[edit] Dynamic Mid-plane
Another trick I often use is the ability to create a work plane between two faces without having to use parameters. While in a part you can simply activate the work plane tool and select two parallel faces/planes and create a work plane that will always update to be in the middle of the selected faces/planes. This works great when you need a work plane in the middle of a plate regardless what thickness the plate is. If the plate thickness is changed, the work plane will also update to remain in the middle of the plate.
[edit] Sheet Metal
[edit] Assemblies (.IAM)
[edit] Weldments
[edit] Presentations (.IPN)
[edit] Drawings (.IDW)
[edit] Adding Hole Quantities to a View
If you need to display the quantity of like holes in a drawing view, there are a few options to do this. Create a hole note from one of the holes and edit the note. You can insert the Quantity Note property from the values and symbols section to display the quantity of holes in the pattern/view.
To specify if you want the quantity to be added from a pattern of from the drawing view, select the Edit Quantity Note in the Option section and choose the appropriate selection.
This is now associatively linked so any changes to the pattern/view will update the hole note.
