swept surface not showing up

Guys,

I am making a simple cable assembly, a atraight piece of wire between two
connectors. I don't want to use ProCable for this, so though I would use a
solid pipe feature. Trouble is the pipe only shows up as a centre line, no
surfaces displayed.

I have my Environment set to show Thick Cables.

So then I tried it as a swept surface. I created a straight datum curve
between two points. Then tried to create the sweep. It wouldn't let me
select the curve as a valid trajectory. I guessed it was because it was a
single segment curve, so I recreated the datum curve as a sketched curve
with two straight segments. This time the Sweep was happy with the
trajectory - go figure! Trouble is, the surfaces still don't show up!

Finally, I created an circular extruded surface between the connectors, and
this time the surfaces did show up. Phew.

But what is wrong that sweeps and pipes don't show? If I create cables using
ProCable they show up fine.

Dave

 

: Guys,
:
: I am making a simple cable assembly, a atraight piece of wire between two
: connectors. I don't want to use ProCable for this, so though I would use a
: solid pipe feature. Trouble is the pipe only shows up as a centre line, no
: surfaces displayed.

This question of substitutes for their routed systems packages has come up a few
times. One of the last times, someone pointed out 'Insert>Advanced>Pipe' as a way
to create pipes without first creating a curve trajectory 'thru points'. It is
pretty handy: just create a bunch of points, actually, one at each place you want
the pipe feature to change direction, then select them to create the pipe. But, as
you point out, Dave, sometimes you don't get geometry. It seems like you created
your pipe in assembly mode. You might have noticed that there was no menu
reference to geometry. Now try creating the pipe in part mode. Besides prompting
you for values for diameter and wall thickness, it gives you a menu selection for
geometry. Geometry in part mode, no geometry in assembly mode (but parametric info
does show up in a drawing). Oh, yeah, and I thought it might be a neat thing to
have in sheetmetal to run some tubing around the outside of a housing: NO pipe
feature in sheetmetal.
:
: I have my Environment set to show Thick Cables.
:
: So then I tried it as a swept surface. I created a straight datum curve
: between two points. Then tried to create the sweep. It wouldn't let me
: select the curve as a valid trajectory. I guessed it was because it was a
: single segment curve, so I recreated the datum curve as a sketched curve
: with two straight segments. This time the Sweep was happy with the
: trajectory - go figure! Trouble is, the surfaces still don't show up!
:
Seems to me I remember the surface collapsing (but oddly, not failing) if the
corner radius was too small.

: Finally, I created an circular extruded surface between the connectors, and
: this time the surfaces did show up. Phew.
:
: But what is wrong that sweeps and pipes don't show?

I don't think it's one thing that's wrong. You have your choice of partial
solutions outside of routed systems and they don't want to make them too good or
you won't have to spend another couple quid on the good stuff.

David Janes

 

We have the routed application, but I don't want to use it for a simple
point to point straight cable. Why? Because it means I have to create lots
of extraneous files to be stored in I-link that won't have proper part
numbers. And it will take longer. So we have the 'good stuff' already. I
wan't a simple solution to a simple problem.

It looks like 3D swept surfaces cannot be created in an assembly. I know I
can create a 2D swept surface, because it works for a sketched curve. Why
does ProE let you attempt to create 3D sweeps if it can't display them? Why
can't ProE display 3d sweeps in an assy? What other types of surface are
useless in an assy that ProE lets you create but not display? When is ProE
going to allow 3D solid features in an assy? I really don't want to store
part files of assy features.

And another gripe! When is PTC going to allow us to measure the length of a
trajectory created as a sketch during feature creation?