Inventor iLogic – Rounding Decimals to Nearest Fraction

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Mark Randa

This post is an adjunct the Shaker Table series, and describes how to grab a decimal number from an Inventor iLogic parameter, round that number to the nearest specified fraction, then pass that new number to a new parameter that will make its way to a Cutlist.

What is happening here is that the model is reporting a length from a driven dimension which can have quite a few numbers after the decimal point. The output we need is the closest fractional equivalent, so we will apply some math to round the driven dimension’s output to a fractional number. In this case, we will round to the nearest 32^nd which would be a shop standard tolerance. The image below shows the driven dimension in question. It is attached to a line that describes the inner face of a corner bracket on a table design. The length of the line is entirely dependent on the overall size of the model as defined by the person fiddling with the inputs…

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iLogic Tutorial for Creating a Woodworking Cutlist 2

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Mark Randa

As a bonus (or total let-down), for this final post in this iLogic TutoriaI mini series, I contacted TigerStop to see if they can shed some light on automating the final list output beyond a printed list. We’ll cross our fingers on that one.

I’ve used the TigerStop stop/gage and pusher system at a couple of the places I’ve worked at, and neither of them had any sort of automation —like using your vacuum cleaner as a push broom. We manually typed in values that were manually pulled from crappy drawings. So we will find a good way to automate…..or die trying. Maybe not. But we will look gosh-darned hard!

On to what can be done in Inventor, making a automated cutlist (pretty damned cool if you ask me). Firstly we should quickly create some proper views. As you can see in the image below, the View Cube is showing an upside-down top view for what should be one of the side views. To remedy this, right click on the View Cube, select Set Current View as… and choose Front.

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iLogic Tutorial for Creating a SmartPart 3

Posted on January 18, 2012 by Mark Randa

In this, the final installment in this little sidebar iLogic tutorial for the Shaker Table series of tutorials, we will add the iLogic code that will hook the model to the spec’s posted at the beginning of this miniseries. Once this tutorial is completed, we will insert this part into the table and have the table control it automatically.

This iLogic Tutorial is winding down –there is not a lot left to do so let’s get right at it. Open up the Hanger Bolt.iam assembly, then open up the iLogic Rule Editor. You should have the following code there…

Inventor Tutorial for SmartPart – Part 3 image 01 - Autodesk Inventor's iLogic code

…if not, you will need to get it there. From looking at the list of available hanger bolts below, we can see that there are no bolts that have two different diameters for a particular length…

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Inventor Tutorial for Making Components From a Multi-Solid Body Part

Posted on January 10, 2012 by Mark Randa

In this Inventor Tutorial we will create multiple parts and an assembly from a single multi-solid body layout part. Then will go back to the original part and modify it to demonstrate the continued linkage between the layout part and it’s children.

This Inventor Tutorial use the Shaker Table as the example –the version being where we left off after the post: iLogic Code for Creating Min/Max Design Limits in Autodesk Inventor – 3. Having said that, any part with multiple solid bodies will work for this demonstration –it’s just easier to be on the same page.

Creating components from your layout parts is incredibly simple. Start by switching to the Manage Tab. On the Layout Panel, click on Make Components. The Make Components: Selection dialog will pop up, where we will in our case select all of the solid bodies in the Solid Bodies folder…

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iLogic Tutorial for Creating Min/Max Design Limits in Autodesk Inventor

Posted on December 30, 2011 by Mark Randa

We will be using the Shaker Table created in an earlier iLogic tutorial as a base for this one, so if you haven’t completed it, I suggest you do so —it is geared towards beginners, and shouldn’t take too long.

This iLogic tutorial was created to answer a reader’s inquiry as to “how to make the mortises auto-update when the tenon changes” when designing mortise and tenon joints. This has been accomplished. The table’s dimensions can easily be manipulated via the Parameter Editor.

Changing the Apron_Width parameter will automatically change the tenon width because we used the -( Apron_Width – ( Tenon_Shoulder * 2 ul ) ) formula to create the distance between the two planes that describe its width extents. The Tenon_Shoulder parameter used in the formula is a driven dimension placed on one segment of a group of three equal segments constrained to the thickness of the apron. As the apron thickness changes, the tenon remains exactly 1/3 of the thickness, and that dimension is transferred via the driven dimension to the mortise in the Leg solid.

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Inventor Material and Colors Creation Tutorial

Posted on December 23, 2011 by Mark Randa

In this very basic tutorial we will be creating several new Inventor colors and a new Inventor material based on stock items found in Inventor’s extensive material library. There is far more that can be done via the Styles Editor, but we will just stick to doing what is necessary to make wood look realistic in Inventor. The only problem I foresee is that some of you may not have the correct permissions to proceed, but here we go regardless…

I will be using the Shaker Table from the Designing a Shaker Table with Autodesk Inventor tutorial as an example, so you may want to start with that if you haven’t already done so.

As I stated before, you need to check your permissions to make sure you have Read-Write capabilities. If not, you would be able to create the material and color, but they would be stored in the document that is open when they are created, and you will not be able to apply them to future parts. To get started, with nothing open in Inventor, click on the Projects icon on the Launch panel of the Get Started tab to bring up the Projects editor…

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Tag Archives: Woodworking Design

Inventor iLogic – Rounding Decimals to Nearest Fraction

This post is an adjunct the Shaker Table series, and describes how to grab a decimal number from an Inventor iLogic parameter, round that number to the nearest specified fraction, then pass that new number to a new parameter that will make its way to a Cutlist.

iLogic Tutorial for Creating a Woodworking Cutlist 2

As a bonus (or total let-down), for this final post in this iLogic TutoriaI mini series, I contacted TigerStop to see if they can shed some light on automating the final list output beyond a printed list. We’ll cross our fingers on that one.

iLogic Tutorial for Creating a SmartPart 3

Inventor Tutorial for Making Components From a Multi-Solid Body Part

In this Inventor Tutorial we will create multiple parts and an assembly from a single multi-solid body layout part. Then will go back to the original part and modify it to demonstrate the continued linkage between the layout part and it’s children.

iLogic Tutorial for Creating Min/Max Design Limits in Autodesk Inventor

We will be using the Shaker Table created in an earlier iLogic tutorial as a base for this one, so if you haven’t completed it, I suggest you do so —it is geared towards beginners, and shouldn’t take too long.

Inventor Material and Colors Creation Tutorial

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This post is an adjunct the Shaker Table series, and describes how to grab a decimal number from an Inventor iLogic parameter, round that number to the nearest specified fraction, then pass that new number to a new parameter that will make its way to a Cutlist.

As a bonus (or total let-down), for this final post in this iLogic TutoriaI mini series, I contacted TigerStop to see if they can shed some light on automating the final list output beyond a printed list. We’ll cross our fingers on that one.

In this Inventor Tutorial we will create multiple parts and an assembly from a single multi-solid body layout part. Then will go back to the original part and modify it to demonstrate the continued linkage between the layout part and it’s children.

We will be using the Shaker Table created in an earlier iLogic tutorial as a base for this one, so if you haven’t completed it, I suggest you do so —it is geared towards beginners, and shouldn’t take too long.

iLogic Blogtorial Links:

Inventor 2013 What's New:

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