For those people doing sheetmetal with SolidWorks

We created two macros. The first one takes a detail drawing and creates a second sheet without a title block, inserts a flat pattern view of the model if sheet metal, otherwise the front view, sets the view to HLR, sets it to tangent edges removed, hides cosmetic threads and deletes any other annotations that may have appeared. In the macro we use the function "CreateFlatPatternViewFromModelView2" with hideBendLines set to "True". It works very well. All that is left to do manually is hide any edges that might exist from features in the model like countersink holes or chamfers. We use a second macro to save the dxf to the appropriate folder.

From API help...

retval = DrawingDoc.CreateFlatPatternViewFromModelView2 ( modelName, configName, locX, locY, locZ, hideBendLines )

Input: (BSTR) modelName Name of model Input: (BSTR) configName Name of configuration Input: (double) locX X coordinate Input: (double) locY Y coordinate Input: (double) locZ Z coordinate Input: (VARIANT_BOOL) hideBendLines TRUE hides bend lines, FALSE does not

--Mark

I'm a new user of SW here. most of the drawings I do is sheetmetal. I did a survey of our sheetmetal shops we use to determine what they would like from us. They wanted a 3d model of the part in IGS or STEP format,unfolded. And a pdf drawing of the detail information (paint spec,part number, etc). They "did not" want an unfolded drawing as they will take care of that themselves.

SW M> What process do you use when converting your sheetmetal models for

We have been using Fabriwin for our NC for a Plasma Machine which I understand that the NC code is very similar. Fabriwin has an OLE integration to SolidWorks It takes the open part unfolds it if it needs to be unfolded and imports the unfolded outline for the cut path. Fabriwin is created by MetalSoft, based out of California. They also sell a nesting software called Intelinest.

Mark, could you possibly send me that macro via email? If not, can you explain what I can add to my existing macro to automatically hide the bend lines? Thanks

I emailed it to you, but here is the code for anyone else who is interested. I used a couple of predefined constants, so swConst.bas must be inported as a module in the project.

' **************************************************************************** ** ' CutPattern.swp macro last edited on 07/10/03 by Mark Reimer ' **************************************************************************** ** Dim swApp As Object Dim Drawing As Object Dim Model As Object Dim Annotation As Object Dim Sheet1 As Object Dim View As Object Dim ModelName As String Dim Sketch As Object Dim pAnnotation As Object

Sub main() Dim Errors As Long Dim Warnings As Long Dim ModelExtension As String

Set swApp = CreateObject("SldWorks.Application") Set Drawing = swApp.ActiveDoc

If Drawing Is Nothing Then MsgBox ("Unable to attach to active document.") Exit Sub End If

If Drawing.GetType swDocDRAWING Then MsgBox ("This macro only works with drawings.") Exit Sub End If

Set View = Drawing.GetFirstView 'The first view is the sheet

If View Is Nothing Then MsgBox ("Unable to get sheet view.") Exit Sub End If

Set View = View.GetNextView ' The next view is actually the first model view

If View Is Nothing Then MsgBox ("Unable to get model view.") Exit Sub End If

ModelName = View.GetReferencedModelName ' Get the model file name referenced by the view ModelExtension = Right(ModelName, 3) ' Get last 3 extension chars to determine model type

If View.IsModelLoaded = False Then View.LoadModel 'if model is not loaded, then load it

If UCase(ModelExtension) = "ASM" Then 'open the assembly silently to get model object Set Model = swApp.OpenDoc6(ModelName, swDocASSEMBLY, swOpenDocOptions_Silent, "", Errors, Warnings) ElseIf UCase(ModelExtension) = "PRT" Then 'open the part silently to get model object Set Model = swApp.OpenDoc6(ModelName, swDocPART, swOpenDocOptions_Silent, "", Errors, Warnings) End If

If Model Is Nothing Then 'If the model cannot be opened, then exit without doing anything MsgBox ("CutPattern Macro could not get model object.") Exit Sub End If

'Add the new sheet and name it ' Format: retval = DrawingDoc.NewSheet3 ( name, paperSize, templateIn, scale1, scale2, firstAngle, templateName, width, height, propertyViewName ) If Drawing.NewSheet3("CutPattern", swDwgPaperAsize, swDwgTemplateNone, 1, 1,

0, "", 0.4318, 0.2794, "Default") = False Then MsgBox ("CutPattern Macro could not create drawing sheet") Exit Sub End If

'Find out if the model is a sheet metal part If Model.GetBendState = swSMBendStateNone Then 'model is not a sheet metal part Drawing.CreateDrawViewFromModelView ModelName, "*Front", 0.215, 0.135, 0 'Go with Front view if no Flat Pattern exists Else ' model is a sheet metal part Drawing.CreateFlatPatternViewFromModelView2 ModelName, "", 0.215, 0.135,

0, True 'insert a Flat Pattern view End If

Drawing.ViewZoomtofit2 'Zoom to fit view on screen

'Get the newly inserted view Set View = Drawing.GetFirstView Set View = View.GetNextView

View.SetDisplayMode (swHIDDEN) 'Set view to "Hidden lines removed" (HLR) View.SetDisplayTangentEdges2 (swTangentEdgesHidden) 'Set view to "Tangent edges removed"

'Delete all annotations and hide cosmetic threads Drawing.ClearSelection 'Clear all current selections

Dim gotsomething As Boolean 'initialize variable gotsomething = False

Set pAnnotation = View.GetFirstAnnotation ' Get the first Annotation in the View if any exist

' Loop through every Annotation in View While (Not pAnnotation Is Nothing) 'If pAnnotation is nothing, then to annotation was selected this time gotsomething = True 'An annotation was found at pAnnotation.GetNext or View.GetFirstAnnotation pAnnotation.Select2 True, 0 'Add the gotten annotation to the selection list If pAnnotation.GetType = swCThread Then 'If annotation is a cosmetic thread, then hide it Drawing.HideCosmeticThread End If Set pAnnotation = pAnnotation.GetNext 'Get the next annotation Wend

If gotsomething = True Then Drawing.EditDelete 'delete any annotations that may have been selected End If

End Sub

Ray, this is exactly how we do it too. Seems to work pretty well for me.

Ive got the entire process pretty much automated. Yes, the generation of flat patterns takes a few minutes, but the overall time is shorter, compared to, say, exporting a flat from autocad and then having to hunt down the geometry errors. Anyway, I have the code installed as an NT service, and it just wanders around the network(s) 24/7 just

*looking* for something new to unfold

I wrote my own DXF exporter, which accesses the geometry directly from the view. This allows me to ignore all BUT the geometry (no bend lines, datum point, center marks, etc) and the scale issue is irrelevant (except for translating the default mm API units to inch). I also wrote exporters for our sheet metal application formats (Fabriwin .prt files and Maker .prt files) so I have the option of exporting directly to CAM.

There are a few issues which I dont see addressed in most sheet metal export schemes:

1) The CreateFlatPatternViewFromModelView API call still returns TRUE if the VIEW was successfully created, and not *necessarily* the flat pattern. This means that if the part has errors and wont unfold, you'll generate nothing but a view of the folded state. I do a rebuild on the referenced configuration and check the return for errors first.

2) If the model has an older style, non-derived flat pattern configuration, (which isnt linked to a 'folded' config), a call to generate a flat pattern view will still use the old config, even on newer installs of SW. The features on these non-derived flat configs are sometimes not updated with its folded view and you can then end up exporting the OLD version of the part.

So generally, I first check to see if the config is derived, and, if not, check to see if any special features have been added AFTER the flat pattern/process bends feature. If there are none, then Id have the code delete this legacy flat config and create a new derived config, using the same naming scheme.

I use fabriwin myself, but for a laser. While Ive seen some proprietary Plasma formats, normally G-Code can be very standard.

Yes, well, I avoid that at all costs. First off, it fails if the part has a Flat Pattern feature instead of the 'process bends' feature. Secondly, fabriwin only uses single-precision decimals internally in its format, and on slight angles and/or non-quadrant arcs, the floating point returns round off errors that create failures in nesting/common cutting, at least when using the higher-precision needed for laser.

This would happen if you did not include swConst.bas in the project because swDocDRAWING is defined as 3 in there and would be 0 otherwise. You can replace swDocDRAWING with 3, in the original code, but there are several other constants that I used from swConst.bas, so the program will still not work unless you were to search for all of them and replace them with the numbered values found there.

The easiest way to make this work is while in the VB editor editing this macro, select File, Import File from the main menu and browse for swConst.bas. It should be found in the SolidWorks\samples\appComm folder.

If you did already import it then I'm not sure what the problem is, but I will resend the original macro to you again at your newer address before it also expires.

--Mark

**************************************************************************** ****************************************************************************

propertyViewName )

When we used Fabriwin, there was often geometry error - particularly in filleted corners - that left open geometry and required repair. You had to add the cut before you'de see the errors, though, and then go back and fix them. Often if you missed an error there would be gaps in the g-code. BTW, I hate Fabriwin for lots of other reasons.

We're now primarly using N-cell for nesting. This also requires clean dxf's for the tool path.

I do a saveas from my SW drawing, highlighting the flat pattern view. First turn off sketches, so the bend lines disappear. In the saveas dialog, select dxf, then go to options to set the scale to 1:1.

Then I load the file into Autocad LT, copy and move the flat view, cut the rest of the drawing, and double check that the scale is correct.

This sounds like a lot of work, but probably only takes 15 seconds. We've done hundreds this way since changing to Ncell, with almost no trouble.

If you just do a "Hide Sketches" in the pull-down menu, it doesnt truly hide the bend line, you can see this by moving your mouse over where the bend line should be. Marks macro hides this though, works great.

Why not just delete the titleblock inside of SolidWorks? This would save you from opening it in Autocad.

The procedure we use doesnt take that long either, about 10-15 seconds, but the more steps you have to do, the greater the chance of an error. Checkout Marks macro he posted. It looks like it works very well.