Assembly 4 workbench

[easyw-fc]

I'm pleased to announce that a new version of Assembly 4 has been released, v0.9.5, with a new measurement tool, completely rewritten from the Caliper of the Manipulator WB.

I'm glad you've found my code useful for your tool, but would you mind to use a different icon for your measurement tool? Using the same I made for Caliper could be misleading for user's of manipulator WB.

[Zolko]

would you mind to use a different icon for your measurement tool?

done.

[drmacro]

Given:

- several FCStd files with LCS's that represent pieces of an assembly
- create new file with A4 Model
- position parts into assembly

Now:

- want to design a new part of the assembly around existing assembly (created above)
- add Part (name it thing1) with sketch, pad, etc.

Questions:
thing1 is now positioned at the world origin. Is it legit to just add LCS's as needed and do you adjust attachment offset?

Would now like to have thing1 as a separate FCStd file. Is this possible.

Hope I expressed this well...
Just trying to my head around the work flow.

[uwestoehr]

I use A4 0.9.6. Since this version (compared to A4 0.9.3) I don't get anymore the Edit Placement dialog when inserting a part.

Nothing happens and I have to open the edit datum dialog manually. Is there a special setting to get this automatically opened?

The same problems happens when I add a LCS to a Model. The LCS is created but the Edit Datum dialog is not automatically opened anymore.

OS: Windows 10 (10.0)
Word size of OS: 64-bit
Word size of FreeCAD: 64-bit
Version: 0.19.21769 (Git)
Build type: Release
Branch: master
Hash: 801bfe4ba5f0910e9b2885917c521ab7fd8e9020
Python version: 3.6.8
Qt version: 5.12.1
Coin version: 4.0.0a
OCC version: 7.3.0
Locale: German/Germany (de_DE)

[Zolko]

I use A4 0.9.6. Since this version (compared to A4 0.9.3) I don't get anymore the Edit Placement dialog when inserting a part.

yes, I know, this is since the UI is in the Task panel: I don't know how to "chain" the commands in the Task panel, so that 1 task opens the next one. With window widgets it was straight-forward, with Task panels simply calling the next command raises an error, because only 1 task can be open at once.

But I think that the UI in the Task panel is more streamlined, and worth this small regression, don't you think also ? Alternatively, I'll have to ask for advice on how to chain Task commands.

[uwestoehr]

But I think that the UI in the Task panel is more streamlined, and worth this small regression, don't you think also ? Alternatively, I'll have to ask for advice on how to chain Task commands.

I like the task panels but the workflow is now much slower. I just assembled 15 parts into one assembly and these additional actions cost a lot of time, (and I had a deadline ) I needed 2 LCS per part, then adding the parts, means 45 manual calls of a dialog to get the assembly done.

I think there must be a solution to call a task dialog from within a workbench command.

-----------------

Maybe a stupid beginner question: I had 4 times the same part in the assembly. How can I maybe just insert it one time and then make a cylindrical array of them?
Or what would you recommend as best solution for this? (At the moment I created 4 LCS in the base part, then added the other part 4 times and each placed to one of the 4 LCS. That works but is quite time consuming.

[ppemawm]

How can I maybe just insert it one time and then make a cylindrical array of them?

Place one LCS at first location for first body or fastener. You can then use an Array from the Draft workbench as shown in this example:

Picture1.png (248.69 KiB) Viewed 570 times

OS: Windows 10 (10.0)
Word size of OS: 64-bit
Word size of FreeCAD: 64-bit
Version: 0.19.21753 (Git)
Build type: Release
Branch: master
Hash: 9bd95ed10f2f988ff38d97ca1ff1f388916b6d39
Python version: 3.6.8
Qt version: 5.12.1
Coin version: 4.0.0a
OCC version: 7.3.0
Locale: English/United States (en_US)

[ppemawm]

But I think that the UI in the Task panel is more streamlined, and worth this small regression, don't you think also ?

Yes, OK by me but takes some time to get use to. Perhaps placing the Edit button next to the Insert button would help.

Also, there are several missing fastener types in Assembly4 compared to the latest revision of the Fasteners workbench, e.g. setscrews, etc. Can these be added please?

[drmacro]

Given:

- several FCStd files with LCS's that represent pieces of an assembly
- create new file with A4 Model
- position parts into assembly

Now:

- want to design a new part of the assembly around existing assembly (created above)
- add Part (name it thing1) with sketch, pad, etc.

Questions:
thing1 is now positioned at the world origin. Is it legit to just add LCS's as needed and do you adjust attachment offset?

Would now like to have thing1 as a separate FCStd file. Is this possible.

Hope I expressed this well...
Just trying to my head around the work flow.

Sorry to ping this, but, I'm having a look at this project today...is the answer so obvious I shouldn't ask?

[uwestoehr]

Place one LCS at first location for first body or fastener. You can then use an Array from the Draft workbench as shown in this example:

Many thanks!
This works, but in the console I get this warning after the creation:

Code: Select all

v_x: Vector (-6.5, 0.0, 0.0)
v_y: Vector (0.0, -6.5, 0.0)
v_z: Vector (0.0, 0.0, 100.0)
n_x: 2
n_y: 2
n_z: 1
use_link: True
Part::FeaturePython / Array: Links go out of the allowed scope

I see that the array is created outside the model. After I put the array into the model by dragging it in the tree, the warning vanishes.
This is what I did:
- selected the part, that is part of the model, in the tree
- made an array of it
as result the array is created outside the model. maybe this is a bug in Assembly 4?