{"id":16360,"date":"2017-04-03T11:00:57","date_gmt":"2017-04-03T15:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/?p=16360"},"modified":"2017-04-03T08:50:51","modified_gmt":"2017-04-03T12:50:51","slug":"confusing-solidworks-configurations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/2017\/04\/confusing-solidworks-configurations.html","title":{"rendered":"Confusing SOLIDWORKS Configurations?"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you do a range of similar products, you will know that configurations of your parts will save you a whole lot of work on a daily basis, but once you have started putting these parts into assemblies it can get confusing. Basically, the possibilities all multiply, as does the potential for selecting and changing the wrong thing\u2026<\/p>\n

Part<\/h1>\n

Here we have a \u201cBracket\u201d part with some configurations in it:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

Assembly<\/h1>\n

This has been used in an assembly (that may be vaguely familiar to many of you), and as you can see from the picture, I have created some configurations in that top level assembly called \u201cBasic,\u201d \u201cBench Mount\u201d and \u201cBack Plate Mount,\u201d and I have just selected the Bracket on screen and used the drop down list to swap the configuration of the part that is used in each configuration of the assembly:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

That to me is the simplest way of doing it \u2013 and that\u2019s what I\u2019m after here. I also have some other parts with configurations, the \u201cCrank arm\u201d<\/strong>:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

And the \u201cKnob\u201d<\/strong>:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

I have fitted these together in another assembly, called \u201ccrank sub\u201d, I then created configurations of this assembly, and I just used the drop down selection list to swap the configurations of the parts that the assembly configurations use:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

So now my \u201ccrank sub\u201d assembly has these combinations: –<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

Great, so far so good.<\/p>\n

It is when the \u201ccrank sub\u201d is put in the top level assembly \u201cUniversal Joint\u201d that there is the potential for confusion!<\/p>\n

I want a range of Universal Joints with different cranks, the important thing to note is that it makes a big difference where you select things!<\/p>\n

You really don\u2019t want to select parts that are inside the sub assembly from the graphics area of the screen when looking at the main assembly, and switch their configurations from the drop-down list \u2013 like this:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

By selecting that part on screen I would be changing the configuration of the part that is being used by the currently selected configuration of the sub assembly!<\/p>\n

In other words I would be in effect editing the sub assembly, and I could get something like this if I was to go ahead:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

Which is not what I want at all!<\/p>\n

What I should do from the main assembly (once I have corrected the configurations in the sub assembly!) is select the name of the sub assembly from the design tree:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

Then I am selecting the existing configurations of the sub assembly that the main assembly will use \u2013 then I can get my full range of different machines:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

So this is how it breaks down:<\/p>\n

\"SOLIDWORKS<\/p>\n

If in any doubt open up each level (part\/sub assembly\/top level assembly) and follow it through\u2026<\/p>\n

And if you want to change what configuration of your sub assembly is being used by your main assembly select its name from the tree!<\/p>\n

The original article can be found on the Solid Solutions Blog<\/a>. For more SOLIDWORKS Hints, Tips & Content check out MySolidSolutions<\/a> or our YouTube Channel.<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I hope that helps…
\nRory Niles
\n<\/strong>SOLIDWORKS Applications Engineer<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you do a range of similar products, you will know that configurations of your parts will save you a whole lot of work on a daily basis, but once you have started putting these parts into assemblies it can<\/p>\n... Continued<\/a>","protected":false},"author":138,"featured_media":16361,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1475,35,36],"tags":[255,519,662,60,453],"class_list":["post-16360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-solidworks-2017","category-tips-tricks","category-usability","tag-assemblies","tag-configurations","tag-parts","tag-tech-tip","tag-tips-and-tricks"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/138"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16360"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16360\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16379,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16360\/revisions\/16379"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}