NX Large Assembly Best Practices Final 1 PDF

Large Assembly Best Practices
Siemens PLM Software
2008. Siemens Product Lifecycle Management Software Inc. All rights reserved
Large Assembly Design Challenge
Designing systems, assemblies, and parts to meet the

requirements of complex products,
in the face of
large data sets: The term "large" assembly is a

relative one. Large assemblies for some may be
1,000 parts while for others 10,000 or 100,000+
complex geometry: Nurb surface data
constantly-changing data
large, distributed teams designing
in same assembly space
Page 2
Large assembly handling in NX

NX contains leading-edge tools and
techniques to facilitate working on large
assemblies
NX has a long and successful history of providing

solutions for such industries as aerospace,
automotive, heavy machinery, shipbuilding, etc.
where large assembly requirements are a key
element
(1) Load Performance and Capacity: Reduce the amount of data per component loaded
(2) Simplification of assembly data : Reduce the complexity of components loaded
(3) Context control: Reduce the number of components loaded
(4) Visualization settings and Memory utilization: Utilize memory more efficiently.
Page 3
Load Performance and Capacity

Load Options
What are they?
A set of options that allow you to control how much

and in what form component data is loaded
Important Properties
Lots of settings including:

Load Method - the location of the data
Load Components all components, no components
or use component filters
Partial Loading display data only
Determine action that should taken if a component
cannot be loaded
Save and restore specific configurations
Accessible from the Open dialog box
Benefits
Using Load Options effectively is one of the most

important ways to improving large assembly
performance
Page 4
Load Options: Selective Loading
Principle
Only load the components that you need to see to do your job
Benefit
Faster load times
Less memory used
Technique
Load with no components
Open components using:
Assembly Navigator
Component filtering
Bookmarks
Page 5
Load Options : Lightweight Creation

Faceting tolerance
Faceting tolerance affects

smoothness, performance,
& memory usage
Default value: calculated per body,

based on bounding box size
User-specified value:
Per body:
AssembliesAdvancedReprese
ntationsParameters
Per session: AssembliesSite

Standards in Customer Defaults
Page 6
Load Performance and Capacity

Reference sets
What are they?
Named sections or partitions of a NX part created in

the Assemblies application
Lets you control the amount of data that is loaded
from each component and viewed in the context of an
assembly
Two types:
Automatic - managed by the system (Empty, Entire
part, Model and Simplified)
User defined - created and modified for your own
purposes (Ex: Mate, Simple, Draft)
Benefits
A well-managed reference set strategy can lead to:

Faster load times
Reduced memory usage
Less cluttered graphics displays
Page 7
Occasional Piece Part Ref Sets
MATE
MODEL ref set plus mating geometry
SIMPLE
Simplified geometry
Entire Part
Model Reference Set
Simple Reference Set
Simple
Page 8
Avoiding & Coping With Assy-Level Ref Sets
Possible Exceptions and Alternative Approaches

1. Use layers to hide unwanted geometry
2. Use assembly-level reference sets with
Add New Components Automatically switch (NX 3)
Hide Some Components
Customer Default
User wants to show only a subset of child components

Examples:
Show different variants
LH & RH assemblies
Create Ref Set Option
Arrangement-specific component suppression

Page 9
Simplification of assembly data
The goal with simplification is to:

Provide a method of hiding proprietary data
Reduce assembly complexity
Improve load performance
There are several methods to simplify geometry in NX:

Assembly Level
Assembly Envelope (Wrap & Linked Exterior

options)
Simplify Assembly Wizard
Simple Reference Set
Faceted Representation
Component Level
Simplify Body
Extract Geometry (Timestamp)
Wrap Geometry
Suppression
Page 10
Simplification
Assembly Envelopes
What are they?
Tools for reducing assembly complexity as well as

hiding proprietary data. Essentially, they create
geometry at the assembly level that can take the
place of subcomponents
Use automatic reference set to specify display of

envelope
Two forms:
Wrap Assembly provides coarse boundaries and
gives a shrink-wrapped appearance
Linked Exterior - makes an exact copy of external
faces and maintains the form of the original
Benefits
Useful when only an approximation of an assembly is

required (Wrap)
Provides a method of improving load performance by
reducing assembly complexity
Provides a method of hiding proprietary data
Wrap Assembly
Linked Exterior
Page 11
Simplify Assembly Wizard

Simplification Assembly Level
What is this?
A dedicated wizard user interface that guides you

through the process of simplifying an assembly into a
solid that represents the assembly
The goal to unite all the bodies in the assembly and

remove the interior faces
All bodies are linked into the work part
Covering bodies are used to plug holes and fill gaps
until all the bodies are united into one and the interior
faces are completely isolated from the exterior faces
The result is a single lightweight and airtight solid
Benefits
Helps reduce load times at the expense of geometric

detail
Preserves complex exterior details while removing
interior details
Page 12
Context Control
Assembly Context Control deals with display, selection & filtering techniques
Assembly context is the set of components you want loaded and visible at a
particular juncture
The assembly context control functions in NX are key to quickly finding,
returning to, and understanding the environment of a specific area to be
worked on
Filtering Techniques
Find Component
Open by Proximity
Product Outlines
Page 13
Context Control
As your assembly becomes larger and more complex, there is an increasing
need for you to control the component parts that you work with and see
Large assemblies depend on filters and other techniques to efficiently navigate
throughout large amounts of data
There are several methods in NX to filter data including:
Component Groups (Filters)
Filtered Assembly Navigator
Zones
Bookmarks
Page 14
Find Component
What is it?
The Find Component tool sets context by letting you

perform a search for a component based on any
global property
Scope criteria:
By Name
By State
By Attribute
From List
By Size - based on the component's bounding
box
The Status line shows the number of components
that are selected in the current contexts
Benefits
Allows you to locate one or more components quickly

in order to establish context control
Find Selected
Component
Page 15
Component Groups
What are they?
A set of tools used to set, save and restore logical

subsets of assemblies for assembly context
Attribute Search
Primarily used for loading and unloading of data

Two categories:
Functional - use assembly data
Attribute, Zone & Proximity
Organizing combinations of functional filters
Match All of, Match any of & Exclude from
Can be saved permanently or temporarily
Benefits
Provide productivity through performance - you only

load what you need
Visual clarity - you only see what you want to see
Intelligent component selection
Page 16
Zones
What are they?
A method of defining and naming regions of space

within an assembly that can be used for filtering
criteria
Can be defined by auto-generating entire assembly or

explicitly sizing
Two Types: Box Zones & Plane Zones
Zones filter components based on a components
bounding box or True Shape filter
Options to select:
Filter
Box: Inside, Interferes, Outside

Plane: Above, Intersects, Below
Defined and stored at the assembly level
Benefits
Provide a useful way of partitioning an assembly

model into meaningful regions
Very useful for volume comparisons
Page 17
Filtering techniques
Open by Proximity
What is it?
A tool that simplifies the process of loading a set of

components that are located in a small region of a
large assembly
Loads all components within a specified distance of
the bounding box of a selected component
Use Cases
When you wish to load large components in the

vicinity of the work part for overview purposes
When you wish to do a "lightweight" or solid load of
nearby components to understand your design
context
Optional True Shape Filtering
accuracy vs. time
Benefits
Simplifies the process of loading a set of components

that are located in a small region of a larger assembly
Page 18
Enabling True Shape Filtering
Setting up tso file generation
Set customer defaults for true shape (tso) file generation

(see on-line help for guidelines)
If necessary, refile existing parts

with option -ts
Creates tso file without re-saving part
Existing users need to ensure

they have set the save option
Page 19
Bookmarks and Product Outline
Bookmarks
What are they?
Product Outline
Bookmarks allows you to record, communicate

and restore the working context from one NX
session to another
Ghost image of assembly that

can be switched on and off
Allows you to duplicate a current assembly

state in a later NX session
Record options include:
which component groups are applied
what are the active Load Options
which components are loaded
User specific workflows native & NX
Manager
Benefits
Allows you to quickly reestablish a desired

working context from one session to another
Provides a method of context sharing between
users
Page 20
Visualization settings and Memory utilization

Visual Settings
Page 21
Visual Performance Preferences

Large Model Settings
What are they?
A number of preferences that can dramatically improve

graphics performance/speed
These viewing dynamics preferences are applicable on

rotate, pan, zoom and navigate operations
Benefits
This greatly reduces the amount of memory needed to

change view orientation in the graphics display
Large Model
Fixed Frame Rate - this will allow the system to display a

box of the component/body on repositioning of the
geometry in the graphics window
View Frustum Culling allows the system to disregard

objects outside of the viewing area
Page 22
Others
Changing body color, translucency, or partial
shading:
o Make the component the Displayed Part before
changing anything or in an assembly. Also, make sure
only the component (not the body or any portion of it) is
selected.
Controlling Updates:
o In a large assembly, you can save time by delaying
interpart updates and then updating at your convenience
Saving in Wireframe vs. Shaded
o Part files saved with shaded display active will take
longer to load and use more memory
o Tests show that a shaded model can take up to 5 times
longer to load than the same model in wireframe
Shaded Mode vs. Partially Shaded Mode
o A less memory intensive option to fully shading
o This means that only bodies/components designated
are shaded when this mode is active
Page 23
Hardware Recommendations
Large Assembly Focus
With the rapid changes in hardware and software, any quantitative
recommendations become obsolete within months
The best recommendation (as an NX customer or any other CAD user) is for
you to monitor technologic advances specifically in the following areas:
Physical memory (#1)
Graphics card speeds and capabilities (#2)
CPU speed
Disk access speed and capacity
Server and network speeds
Page 24
Check system configuration as per standards
Page 25
Hardware Recommendations
Large Assembly Focus
Tuning graphics card
Windows Desktop
Display Properties Advanced
select graphics card Control Panel.
Under application or global presets
Select NX.
Start NX
Preferences Visualization
Evaluate Graphics Performance.
Exit NX
Page 26
Large Assembly Drawings

The creation and update of large assembly drawings is computationally expensive by
nature
In particular, the creation of hidden line renderings of views
As well as requiring all relevant components to be loaded into the session, the hidden
line calculation itself demands significant memory and processor resource
NX provides techniques for making the process more efficient by reducing the amount
of data that typically needs to be loaded to create or annotate a drawing and its views
Page 27
Large Assembly Drawings Topics

Master Model Strategy
Delaying View Updates
Associative Extracted Edge Views
Faceted Representation Views

Predefined Drawing Templates
Page 28
Master Model Strategy

What is this?
Instead of creating the drawing in the assembly itself,

the master model strategy takes advantage of a nonmaster document that references the master
assembly
Create through File>New dialog box
Benefits
Promotes concurrent engineering, by enabling a user

to modify the drawing without locking the master
assembly - Drafting and modeling changes can
happen in parallel
Separates annotation data from the master assembly

- which means you can load the master assembly
without needing to load the drawing data into the
session - this speeds up the loading process and
reduces memory consumption
Page 29
Delaying View Updates

What is this?
A major contributor to performance and memory

usage issues with large assembly drawings is the
amount of resource required to update views (in
particular, the hidden line renderings)
The Delay View Update option allows you to minimize
view updates
Updates can be initiated explicitly at a more

convenient time or by using a UG/Open program
View updates can also be delayed on a per-view
basis
Benefits
Improves performance and memory usage by

reducing the amount of resource required to update
views
Prevents hidden line recalculations when the
assembly changes
Page 30
Associative Extracted Edge Views

What are they?
An alternative way to display model geometry in a

drawing view by creating a set of associatively
extracted edges
Instead of the model being directly visible in the
drawing views, the system displays a 3D
representation of the model's visible edges
Supports Concurrent Engineering

Associative or Non-Associative methods
The components only need to be loaded when a
drawing update is performed
Benefits
Improves performance by allowing simple annotation,

view edits, and the creation of detail views can be
made on large assemblies without the assembly
components being completely loaded
Page 31
Faceted Representation Views

What are they?
Renderings of a faceted representation of the

assembly
Can be used for dimensioning

List others
Update drawing view at a more convenient time
Benefits
Facilitates the quick update and hidden line display of

a drawing of a large assembly
Using faceted representations when creating drawing
views can dramatically improve the performance and
memory utilization of assemblies drawings
Page 32
Predefined Drawing Templates

What are they?
A capability that results in automatic drawing view

creation by creating a new master model drawing
from a modeling view
The template contains empty drawing views that are

not linked to a model
Drag and drop a model / assembly onto the template
and the views populate with the model Drawing
Templates can include the following:
Drawing Borders
Imported Views
Section Views
Exploded Views
Automatic Ballooning
Applies dimensions and annotation
Populate Parts List and Tables
Benefits
Saves considerable time by eliminating repetitive

tasks creating a standard layouts of component parts
/ assemblies
Page 33

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Large Assembly Best Practices

Siemens PLM Software

Siemens PLM Software

Large Assembly Design Challenge

Designing systems, assemblies, and parts to meet the

large data sets: The term "large" assembly is a

Siemens PLM Software

Large assembly handling in NX

NX has a long and successful history of providing

Siemens PLM Software

Load Performance and Capacity

A set of options that allow you to control how much

Lots of settings including:

Using Load Options effectively is one of the most

Siemens PLM Software

Load Options: Selective Loading

Faster load times

Less memory used

Load with no components

Open components using:

Siemens PLM Software

Load Options : Lightweight Creation

Faceting tolerance affects

Default value: calculated per body,

Per session: AssembliesSite

Siemens PLM Software

Load Performance and Capacity

Named sections or partitions of a NX part created in

A well-managed reference set strategy can lead to:

Siemens PLM Software

Occasional Piece Part Ref Sets

Model Reference Set

Simple Reference Set

Siemens PLM Software

Avoiding & Coping With Assy-Level Ref Sets

Possible Exceptions and Alternative Approaches

Hide Some Components

User wants to show only a subset of child components

Create Ref Set Option

Arrangement-specific component suppression

Siemens PLM Software

Simplification of assembly data

The goal with simplification is to:

There are several methods to simplify geometry in NX:

Assembly Envelope (Wrap & Linked Exterior

Simplify Assembly Wizard

Simple Reference Set

Extract Geometry (Timestamp)

Siemens PLM Software

Tools for reducing assembly complexity as well as

Use automatic reference set to specify display of

Useful when only an approximation of an assembly is

Siemens PLM Software

Simplify Assembly Wizard

A dedicated wizard user interface that guides you

The goal to unite all the bodies in the assembly and

Helps reduce load times at the expense of geometric

Siemens PLM Software

Siemens PLM Software

Siemens PLM Software

The Find Component tool sets context by letting you

Allows you to locate one or more components quickly

Siemens PLM Software