Removing detail from complex assemblies

Here's the scenario:
I have a fairly complex assembly with hundreds of parts. I need to
send portions of it to different vendors. For example, the outer
enclosure is sheetmetal, it goes to the sheetmetal shop (they use SW,
no need for drawings).

Problem:
I don't want to ship the model of the whole product to my vendors.
Many reasons. First, it is unnecesary. Second, there are design
elements that are proprietary and should not leave the office in the
context of a complete design.

Is there a way to save a new assembly with parts and sub-assemblies
removed? The problem is that lots of parts and assemblies have
references to other parts and assemblies. So, deleting is out of the
question or the design blows-up. I'm sure there's a more elegant way
to way to handle this.

Thanks,

-Martin

 

I'm not sure what you're trying to achieve.
You mention the specific example of the sheet metal enclosure, but
presumably you can just email this single part to your supplier?
Does this not also apply to any other parts?

If some of the other suppliers need sub-sections of the assembly, then I
suspect that using configs and suppressing the unwanted components and then
exporting it as a parasolid or IGES might do the trick.

If suppliers need the whole assembly, but only as an envelope, and you don't
want them to have access to the part historys, then you can save the
assembly as a single part (see file/save as) with the option of using the
external surfaces only.

John H

 

Not sure of what you need, but save as part/ outer surfaces only gives
you... exactly what it says.