Working with Difficult Fillets in Inventor

A new option called Minimal was added to the Fillet Setbacks tab. Select the Minimal option so the system can define the minimum allowable setback for a given vertex.

This option often provides the smoothest transition and increases the probability of solving difficult vertex fillets. Let’s take a look at working with setbacks.


Let's take a look
http://www.screencast.com/t/i7Q3583L
Created by Dave one of the Cad Geeks

Fay, Fay Go Away.....I'll Show You a Balloon Trick Today


Tropical storm Fay has been playing tricks on us Floridians. Seems it just keeps swirling around the state like a balloon in a wind tunnel. Speaking of balloons and tricks, I'd like to share a few tricks when placing or adding ballons that you may or not be aware of....




Wind and rain battered John with the INCAT CAD Geeks

100 people cant be wrong..........User powered site

In one week we already have 100 members on the site creating cool Inventor content and topics at our new site.

Join today

http://autodeskinventorusers.ning.com/

See you online,
Kevin with the INCAT CAD Geeks

Non-Inventor Feature Recognition For Stubburn Features

A while back one of the other CAD Geeks blogged about this tool also.
I wanted to take it a bit further in detail.

Feature Recognition is a very usefull tool for making more inteligent models out of data that is created in other CAD packages. Sometimes not all of the features can be generated by using the automatic function. When this happens I use the same tool but go at it a litlle more manualy.
You can also pick like features at the same time to speed this up.


I used this to take some data from a Pro-E file type and make an Inventor part with true features.


This can save you hours of time by not having to remodel from scratch a needed part.

Check out my video here:



Enjoy,
Jim.....Another INCAT CAD Geek!

Stop the "Save Copy As" madness: Copy Components instead


I often hear people say they have to use the "Save copy As" option in Inventor in order to create a "similar" component as one already in their design. In most of these cases they just happened to overlook the "Copy Component" tool in Inventor's assembly panel. The Copy Component tool allows us to copy parts and assemblies within our current design and place them with new file names into our current window. This requires about half the time as the Save Copy As workflow. Check out an example in this video:




Contributed by Ben of the INCAT CAD Geeks

Autodesk Inventor Users Unite.......

So..........fellow Autodesk Inventor Users be sure and check out this new web tool called www.ning.com

It basically allows you to create a social networking website about anything, so guess what......I made one just for Autodesk Inventor users.....http://autodeskinventorusers.ning.com/

The best thing about this tool, each of you can create your own site about anything Autodesk Inventor related within it. WOW........lets see if we can create the "One Stop Shop for Inventor Users" to share knowledge.

Kevin with the INCAT CAD Geeks

Adding DWF Into a Microsoft Word Document

I placed a blog not to long ago about adding the dwf technology into a PowerPoint. Not all of us have to do presentations, so why not work with dwf files inside of Microsoft word document. This can be used in quotations, specification writing or anything else you associate or would like to associate your cad data with. It's something that just may separate you from your competition. Check it out
http://www.screencast.com/t/KjXywQFPy
Submitted by Dave of the INCAT CAD Geeks

iFeatures - Ease your repetitive needs


I was just thinking about the work I used to do when I was in the CAD design world and whish someone had thrown this tool in along time ago for me.

iFeatures. Think how many times you draw the same things over and over again. Most of us get so caught up in just making models that we don't try do make models faster or easier than we could.

iFeatures alow you to take those repeat features and save them out to a Catalogue to use over and over again. Now imagine multiple designers creating quick edit drop in features that you spend time sketching everyday.

Check out my video on how easy this realy is.

Enjoy,
Jim........Another INCAT CAD Geek!

Adaptive Parts with Driven Constraints


One of the Inventor "Tricks of the Trade" that I used to show customers is the ability to drive adaptivity with a driven assembly constraint. This allows a part to stretch to the appropriate size though a given range of motion in an assembly. This allowed us to animate flexible parts that would otherwise always be shown as a static size. Part parameters can be animated in Inventor Studio now, but driving adaptivity can be easier to get a quick point across. Take a look at this video for an example:

Contributed by Ben of the INCAT CAD Geeks

Autodesk Intent Introduction


Autodesk has recently debuted a new product known as Intent. Today's video discusses the essentials of this exciting new product.

What is Autodesk Intent? Autodesk Intent is the premier platform for automating your design, engineering, and reporting tasks. Autodesk Intent is a powerful computing language that works in conjunction with Autodesk Inventor. With Intent, users can quickly generate detailed models, drawings, cost estimates, engineering studies, bills of materials, reports, and proposals.

Watch the video below to find out more about how INCAT and Intent can dramatically increase your company's productivity today!

Check out the video HERE!

Presentation Instructions


One of the nice things about the presentation environment in Autodesk Inventor is that you can add assembly instructions to your exploded views. During each sequence, you can adjust the camera angle and add text to specific things you would like to make note of. Nice thing is, when you output this to DWF formay, all of that integrity is captured and passes along to whoever you send it to. I wish companies would include this instead of the misleading assembly instructions included in most "some assembly required" things you purchase at the store. Now there is an idea!

Check ot the video HERE

What rung of the Autodesk Digital Prototyping ladder are you on?

So how are you and your co-workers making progress on the Autodesk Digital Prototyping ladder.....Check out this cool video to see how you and your peers are stacking up.

"Autodesk Digital Prototyping for Industrial Machinery"



Simply by owning Inventor you are already on the ladder....so now you just need to start taking steps to move closer to Digital Prototyping.

Kevin with the INCAT CAD Geeks

Utilizing Shrink Wrap with Inventor

Autodesk Labs Strikes Again. A feature I know a lot of users have been looking for. How to go about creating a simplified solid for use in larger assemblies or be able to ship a 3D model to a customer and not have to worry about giving them my native file which could be reverse engineered. Also no need for a pack and go if they only need a representation of the model.

Check it out

http://www.screencast.com/t/McfTInGGpz2

Created by Dave of the Incat Cad Geeks

Zooming around for better Presentation Files


I was working with some files this week to create a nice presentation for a customer and thought you might like to add this to your bag of tricks.

Inside of the IPN file you can do some nice view control to make good instructional files.

This is an easy bonus if you already make Exploded Assembly views for drawings.
You can even add text information to them to show up inside of a DWF file as well.

These are nice for publishing to AVI as well.



Enjoy,
Jim......Another INCAT CAD Geek!

Advanced Simulation on Autodesk Labs


I just found the time to check out the new Advanced Simulation technology preview on Autodesk Labs, and I am mightily impressed with the direction Autodesk is taking this technology. You can define all kinds of design variants and design criteria to use in a functional study.

Take a look at this video for an example of this new technology in use:

Contributed by Ben of the INCAT CAD Geeks