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Friday, October 31, 2014

Tip of the Week October 31


NX Tip of the Week
October 31, 2014

NX - Changing Feeds and Speeds in Multiple Operations in NX CAM

In NX CAM, you can change Feeds and Speeds in multiple operations at the same time.  An example may be if you have 10 milling operations using the same cutter and you have your part programmed with Feeds and Speeds set for cutting Aluminum but then you want to use those same operations on a part made from Mild Steel.  Instead of opening each individual operation to change the Feeds and Speeds values, you can do this all at once by using Object > Feed Rates.  Below is an example of changing multiple Spot Drilling operations that did not have any Feeds and Speeds values generated.

1) Select all of the operations that you want to change:



2) Right click and select "Object > Fee Rates":


3) In the Feeds and Speeds dialog, enter the desired Speed and Feed values and click "OK":


4) Now notice that each operation has been changed according to the values that were entered:



Chad Varney
Application Engineer
Ally PLM Solutions, Inc.

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Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Agricultural equipment manufacturer cuts manufacturing lead time 30%

Farmgép designs better with Solid Edge. Solid Edge helped Farmgép move from 2D to 3D design to build better agricultural sprayers and boost new equipment revenue 50 percent. The results also included a 60 percent increase in export sales. The company uses  Solid Edge’s synchronous technology on a daily basis to add or remove parts from a CAD assembly imported from one of our suppliers.

Learn how
  
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Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Simplified Assemblies

In collaborative work it is very often beneficial to be able to send parts or assemblies to others if their work will be affected by your design work, however; those parts or assemblies very often contain extremely detailed information on all of your intellectual property. Because of this it may be desirable to be able to easily simplify models so that they do not contain sensitive information.

Learn more from our Knowledge Base by clicking HERE.

If you have any issues, contact techsupport@allyplm.com.

Madison Rye
Application Engineering Manager
Ally PLM Solutions, Inc

Thursday, October 23, 2014

Tip of the Week October 24

NX Tip of the Week

October 24, 2014
NX 8.5 and NX 9.0 - Sketch Constraint Tips and Tricks

In this week's tip, we are going to take a look at how to apply constraints to a sketch in NX 8.5/9.0. Starting in NX 8.5 a new look sketch constraint tool was introduced. When clicking the new sketch constraint command, it requires you to select the desired geometric constraint first then define the geometry. In prior versions, you selected the desired geometry and the available inferred constraints would only be displayed. A new floating toolbar called the shortcut toolbar can help us achieve this behavior without even going into the sketch constraints command.

Before we dive into that workflow, let's investigate how the new Geometric Constraints command works.
1) Click on the Geometric Constraints Tool:

2) When you first go into the command, the dialog below is presented (NX 9).  This tells us that there are other methods to apply constraints and this dialog is helpful when doing multiple items in one session of the constraint type. One that is mentioned is the shortcut toolbar which we will investigate later:

3) Notice we are prompted to select the constraint type first, then the geometry:

4) If you are doing a one-to-one constraint, you will need to advance the dialog. This means I'm picking one item in my first step to constrain and one item in the second step to constrain to.

        a. For example, I want to create a midpoint constraint to make my rectangle symmetric.  I'm going to select the midpoint constraint first:

       b. Then I will select the left vertical line for the "Select Object to Constrain" step:

        c. I need to select the "Select Object to Constrain to" to make active.  I need to advance the dialog. If you are constraining one object to one object, you might forget to advance the dialog (remember middle mouse button will also advance the dialog onto the next step).  I will select the origin for the second select set:


d. The constraint is now applied.

e. Now let's do the other midpoint constraint.  Notice the option "Automatic Selection Progression". This will automatically advance the dialog for us after the first selection is made.  Let's turn on this option.  In NX 8.5, this option is under the "Settings" group:


            f. I will select the top horizontal line for the "Select Object to Constrain" step:


         g. Notice the dialog is automatically advanced to the "Select Object to Constrain to" step: 



h. I will now select the origin. The constraint is now placed.

5) The purpose of the previous steps was to show the natural interaction with the Geometric Constraints dialog when constraining sketches.  Keep in mind you need to advance the dialog or turn on the "Automatic Selection Progression".  If you need to select multiple items in the "Select Object to Constrain" step, you will want to turn off "Automatic Selection Progression".

Now we are going to look at the inferred Geometric Constraints workflow by interacting with the shortcut toolbar.  With this method, we will not even go into the Geometric Constraints command.

1) I'm going to create the same midpoint constraint as I did earlier.  

2) This time just select the left vertical line.  Notice a floating toolbar called the shortcut toolbar comes up. To the left of the divider, you see typical right click menu commands.  To the right of the divider you see possible geometric constraints that were inferred based on the geometry type (line/arc) and that only one item was selected.  I'm not going to select anything from the shortcut toolbar yet:

3) Now I'm going to select the origin.  Notice the shortcut toolbar changes the available geometric constraints because I have 2 items selected.  Different constraints are inferred similar to what we did prior to NX 8.5.  Here I'm going to select the midpoint constraint: 

4) The shortcut toolbar is dismissed and the midpoint constraint is applied:

5) In this example, we just selected the desired geometry for the constraints and the proper constraint is inferred and presented in the floating toolbar.  We didn't use the Geometric Constraints command.

That concludes this week's Ally PLM Tip and Trick.  We looked at the natural progression of using the Geometric Constraints dialog as well as the option to automatically advance the dialog.  We also looked at using the floating shortcut toolbar to apply geometric constraints. 

Brandon Carter
Senior Application Engineer
Ally PLM Solutions, Inc.
  
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Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Edunburgh Elevator cuts material cost 18%, shortens customer quote cycle from 2 weeks to2 hours

Edunburgh Elevator designs better with Solid Edge. The company is engaged in R&D, manufacturing, sales, installation and maintenance of elevators, escalators and car parking equipment. Solid Edge and its synchronous technology helped condense new product R&D cycles from 1 year to 10 months. Other benefits included improved visualization with 3D design, simulated product performance and development of an automated quotation system.


Learn how

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Monday, October 20, 2014

Tip of the Week October 17

Solid Edge - Why Are Most of the PMI Commands Grayed Out in an Alternate Assembly?

  • There is not a way to add PMI to specific members, you have to be in "global edit mode"
  • Go to the Alternate Assembly tab
  • Check the "Apply edits to all members" box 

Navjot Gill
Application Engineer
Ally PLM Solutions, Inc.

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Thursday, October 16, 2014

Forestry and agricultural products maker enhances product quality and durability


Lid Jarnindustri designs better with Solid Edge. As a result, the company is now able to compete with low-cost suppliers. It has enhanced customer service, increased speed for altering product design, improved communication between customers, designers and its production line, and reduced the  number of physical prototypes. 








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Friday, October 10, 2014

Tip of the Week October 10

Solid Edge - Using MICE with Keypoint Curve

You can reduce the time to find the locations you need by using the keyboard shortcut MICE (Midpoint, Intersecting, Center, Endpoint) to snap to the locations on a line or curve. Some users have had issues in the past getting this to work with a Keypoint Curve.

If your Keypoints are set to "All" instead of "Center and Endpoint", you won't see that you need to press "K" first. Set your Keypoints to "Center and Endpoint" then the Prompt Bar tells you to press "K" in order to enable the MICE shortcuts. 


Nathan Pfeiffer
Application Engineer
Ally PLM Solutions, Inc.

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Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Materials handling and conveyor technology expert reduces order lead times and errors

Verhoeven Oss designs better with Solid Edge. The engineering and production center specializes in materials handling and conveyor technologies. Results from the use of Solid Edge and Teamcenter (both from Siemens PLM Software) include more functionality added to its machines and better product quality. 





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Friday, October 3, 2014

Adding file extensions to SharePoint 2010 - Solid Edge ST7

SharePoint 2010 does not display the file extensions which can be frustrating. The file type can be sorted by clicking the "Type" dropdown in the view but if you want to display the extensions click HERE.

If you have any issues, contact techsupport@allyplm.com.

Madison Rye
Application Engineering Manager
Ally PLM Solutions, Inc

Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Labeling machine manufacturer optimizes material use, implements near error-free design process

TATXA designs better with Solid Edge. TAXTA specializes in the production of labeling machines for the food, cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries, as well as for cleaning products and other special applications. Other results included reduced costs across operations, increased machine availability and opportunity, and improved product performance as well as product aesthetics.

  

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