ma201-5_robinson_v2 - power tools

8/7/2019 MA201-5_robinson_v2 - Power tools

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Introduction

AutoCAD Mechanical has been around since AutoCAD R14. In the first release basic

annotation tools like geometric tolerances, weld symbols and surface texture mademechanical drafting easier. Holy cow it sure has expanded from those days into afeature packed time saving mechanical design tool. Over the next hour we will learnabout a few AutoCAD Mechanicals features that can be used with almost zero learningcurve


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Zero learning curve features

Warm-ups

In order to get the blood flowing and get loose before we lift the heavy stuff we our going to

start with a few light lifting with some nice drafting tools.

Construction Lines

Every drawing you create you end up generating construction geometry that gets used to help

finalize your drawing. AutoCAD Mechanical has more construction lines than I could ever use:

at a distance from a line at an absolute angle at an angle relative to another line bisecting an angle circular tangential to two lines concentric circles perpendicular to a line perpendicular to two points tangential to a circle tangential to a line tangential to two circles

My personal favorite is the Automatic C-line creation command

Example result of Automatic C-Line creation


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Centerlines

Centerline creation is always a task I would do near the end in order to ensure that my

dimension where created based of the centerline for clarity. Now, using AutoCAD Mechanicalcenterlines can be created while your draw your objects.

centerline cross with angles centerline cross on a full circle centerline cross on a plate centerline cross in a corner centerline cross in a hole centerline between two lines centerline cross centerline cross with a hole

In the example below you can see how the Centerline cross on plate can automate common

drafting tasks.

Before Command After Command


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Power Snap

As long time AutoCAD users we know and love running object snaps. We also have just gotten

use to turning a few on and off throughout the day to accommodate the given task. Or maybeyou prefer to still use the single object snap for every click. The Power Snap command allows

you to have four preset configurations of your object snap settings. Each one of these

configurations and be easily toggle to by using the Power Snap pull down menu shown below.

Another hidden jewel is the entity filter to ignore things like hatch.


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Associative Hide

Line by line, window select, and quick select or make you hidden layer current prior to drawing.

All four of the workflows listed will get the job done, but not at the same caliber as AutoCADMechanical. The Associative Hide command allows you to select any collection of lines and tag

them as being in front of other lines. After this selection set is complete any line that should be

hidden instantly becomes hidden. Now, if that isnt cool enough for you, these hide situations

update as the data changes. Since these hide situations are kept track of in the drawing they

can be adjusted and recalled at anytime.


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Power Dimensioning

Back when I had a real job doing design, I could not stand doing

dimensioning. Luckily I had a few interns working for me who needed the

practice. AutoCAD by itself has made great strides within its dimensioning

feature set. The ability to tweak decimal precision, style, and text position on

the fly all speed up formatting. However for things like tolerances, AutoCAD

still needs some work for the demands of a mechanical drawing.

Enter AutoCAD Mechanicals Power Dimensioning

command which combines linear, angular, baseline,

chain and diametric or radial all into one command.

Each one of these dimension types can be invoked

with a simple right click and selection from the menu.

In addition to cutting down on the number of

dimension commands needed, instant formatting of

each dimension is a breeze with the Power

Dimensioning dialog. Long gone are the days of

memorizing dimension overrides and creating one-off

dimension styles to suppress a dimension line that

overlaps another line.

One icon down on the Power

Dimensioning fly out menu is the

Automatic Dimensioning command

which allows even further automation

of tedious dimension tasks.


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Screws, Nuts, Clevis Pins and Steel Shapes, Oh My!

Gone are the old days of opening the Machinerys Handbook and looking up tables in order

draw fasteners or tapped holes. Which is good since my copy of the book was never broken inenough to stay open on my desk. Over 750,000 parts ship with AutoCAD Mechanical that can

be quickly placed, edited, and swapped out. For all the content placed you can also right-click

on each one and choose Power View to generate an orthographic view like front, right, or

bottom quickly. In addition to placing hardware as separate parts you can use the Screw

Connection command to place multiple parts at once. This command can place the screw,

washer, clearance hole, tapped hole, and a nut as needed.


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Detail View Creation

When creating those shop drawings you always try to ensure you give the adequate amount of

drawing info they need in order to make the part. Frequently the use of detail or scaled viewsreally helps convey the important design information in areas of complexity. Most likely in core

AutoCAD you take these steps:

1. Draw a circle of the desired area.2. Copy the objects and the circle.3. Place elsewhere and begin trimming up all the data outside the circle.4. Scale up as needed.5. Add dimensions with the proper DIMLFAC.

For those who use paper space, which I bet is still few and far between; you would create a

viewport on your layout and then add your dimensions.

With AutoCAD Mechanical you can just use the detail command which can automated both

process described above. After starting the command you simply drag a circle or rectangular to

determine the area for detail view creation. Next, you will be given plenty of options to control

how you want to create your detail view even with view labels.


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Coolest thing in 2D since 3D came out

Mechanical structure

When I used to generate a new assembly design Ialways did my best to keep track of my parts by usinglayers. In cases where I had moving parts I wouldtypically generate blocks of the layer by part, in orderto move them easier. The Mechanical Structuretoolset inside AutoCAD Mechanical finally allowsdesigners to track parts in assemblies within a 2Ddrawing. This type of design management is typicallyonly found in 3D systems like Autodesk Inventor.

Mechanical Structure uses a browser to graphicallytrack the relationship between parts and assemblies.While using Structure previous tasks like trying to useX-refs for mechanical design have also beenstreamlined. Structure as great feature called Foldersthat basically acts like dynamic blocks. Starting withFolders is a great way to break the ice with Structure.Lastly, since there is no push button to convert olddrawings to Mechanical Structure, you should starttrying in on new designs. However Chris Palmatierfrom Autodesk taught a class at Autodesk University

last December called Moving Legacy Data toMechanical Structure. If you are interested in hiscontent, email me and I will get a copy to you.


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Other features to discover

Mechanical Calculators

Now that I am in the teaching business I dont have to worry about doing any crazy formulas to

make sure my part doesnt fail. Assuming you are better at math than I am, but you would still

like to be a little faster, AutoCAD Mechanical can help. Below are a few samples of the tools:

The calculation toolbar can be accessed by right clicking on any empty gray space next to a

toolbar and selecting AMFLY. Some of these same tools can also be started by going to the

CONTENT pull down menu and selecting calculation from the menu.

2D FEA


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Screw Calculator

Bearing design


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Inventor Link

Some companies have customers, vendors or other departments that use Autodesk Inventor.

The Inventor Link functionality allows AutoCAD Mechanical users to generate associative 2D

view like front, right, top, section and detail from the 3D model. In case of a design change all

the view can automatically be updated.

Note: The Inventor Link option must be selected when prompted for during the installation.


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Autodesk Vault

Keeping track of x-refs seems to be something the architects are better at. A few years back

Autodesk acquired some great technology that helps keep track of your files. This technologyhas now been transformed into Autodesk Vault which ships with AutoCAD Mechanical, AutoCAD

Electrical and Autodesk Inventor. Vault enables you and other designers to instantly search

thousands of files, check in and out designs, build attachments to other engineering related

documents.

Note: Autodesk Vault is installed from a separate CD that comes with your software.


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Summary

As you can see AutoCAD Mechanical has tools to instantly make you more productive with your

mechanical drafting. In addition, features like the Calculators, Structure, and Autodesk Vault allbegin separating AutoCAD Mechanical from just being a drafting tool. For more product

information about AutoCAD Mechanical see http://www.autodesk/products . If you would like to

contact me about anything, I would love to hear from you.

Contact Info:

Kevin Robinson

[email protected]

INCAT

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