BIM (Building Information Model) is the architectural version of what has been around in other forms for other trades for some time now. With Autodesk Inventor, a Designer has the ability to embed information directly into a model such as cut sheets, installation instructions, etc. Also, there are parts repositories on the web that have ready-made pumps, valves, pneumatic clamps, and a myriad of other parts and assemblies that represent actual products, and can be easily placed into a design. In the image below from TraceParts, you can see that I pulled up a crank handle that a German manufacturer has placed there. The model in the window is 3D, and I can rotate and zoom to get a good look…

I downloaded this part, and found it to be an assembly of two parts as shown below. I have one of the parts active so that I can check what information exists in the part (which is why the knob is ghosted). If you look at the properties dialog, you will notice that they have not specified a material for the part. If this were added to a prototype of a train or other form of transportation, weight and center of gravity become very critical, and the default material is water –which is quite heavy. Not having the correct material properties defeats the whole purpose of Design Information Modeling (digital prototyping) –having a model that simulates its real-world counterpart…

When we look at the Project tab, we see that beyond a part number, all information points towards TraceParts, so the engineer or designer would have to go track down the missing information starting with them…

And finally, there is no color to the part nor is their a cut sheet embedded to give further information. In my opinion, this is a poor implementation of DIM, but it starts to give  you an idea of how having parts models available is a damn good idea for the manufacturer as designers are likely to use a pre-made part before reinventing the wheel and creating it themselves. And once parts are placed in a model, they become part of the bill of materials. In the case of hinges and drawer guides, it is unlikely a company would model one thing and try to override the BOM and use another in manufacturing.

Page two, Content Center and iParts…