Can't Change Density in SW2005

I'm not running 2005 yet, so I haven't had a chance to try this. Still, perhaps a back-door API approach might work.

Free density manager program available at

Dan Bov> Just installed SW2005 SP0 on my home machine. Been using SW on a daily basis

the

settings"

properties" >

worked. BUT,

works fine here thru doc properties.

the material editor is primarily for those who wish to employ realview and/or cosmos works. if you do not intend use either of the previously mentioned, don't bother with material editor.

out of curiosity, if and when you create a custom material and assign a color (material editor), do the color palettes appear twice (dull, shiny, standard, transparent)? would also be nice if when creating custom material they would automatically alphabetize themselves.

Yes! I ran into this too and it drove me nuts! Some files were not affected but some were. Man, I forgot to submit that one.

Mike Wilson

Good question. I just updated a few days ago and haven't had a chance to check. I'll take a look...

Mike

Yep, still there.

Mike

Dan,

I e-mailed you the program that I created for a simple density change from an excel list of materials. The files need to be in the same folder. Anyway you can check out if the API is changing the property properly.

Corey

There was a problem in 2003/2004 with density settings and configurations. You could sometimes make configuration specific density changes if you did it through the icon for mass properties, but if you then looked at density through the document properties dialog it reset the whole part to that value. Supposedly the ability to have robust configuration specific mass properties was a 2005 enhancement.

Could you post your source? Just curious.

Corey

I was managing CAD and some of my people discovered they could change mass properties on a config by config basis through the mass properties icon. Later on there were problems with the assembly's weight which we traced back to this method of setting. A thorough search of the various methods of setting mass properties including a search of API methods showed that SW intended for a single part to have only one mass property at a time. The ability to set it in various configs was an anomaly and gave random problems. I believe we got an SPR on it, but I don't have access to the number anymore.

The reason we had for assembly specific mass properties was that we made the same part geometry out of steel or aluminum depending on the application.

Thank you.

Has anyone turned this one in yet? I'm running in to the same issue - can't set a part to UHMW density, and there isn't a material already defined for it.

WT

I don't know if this was mentioned, but it appears that the value is changeable until you actually assign a material to the part and then remove it. After that it isn't changeable.

WT

Thanks Corey,

I installed the macro you sent and after you helped me adjust it to suit my machine I got it to work. It is a great macro! But as others have pointed out, that once you remove the material from the part, the material density reverts back to whatever it was before. I had great hopes that your macro could work around this bug, but alas it doesn't change the density. If I start a new part from a template that doesn't have a material assigned to it, then your macro works great it changes the density to whatever I pick. But as soon as I assign it a material THEN remove the material, the density cannot be changed either manually or with the macro. I did forward this problem to my VAR and encourage others to do so. I am sure its a bug.....and they are probably working on as we speak!!!

Thanks for the macro and all the help you gave me... you macro is definitely a keeper.

Dan

Just tried in SP1.1 - fixed!

WT

that is such a great idea to go way back and say that it was fixed. There have been times that I wondered if something had ever been fixed and how far up the SP list you have to go to get to it.

Corey