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In The Machine is the official blog of the Inventor Product Management Team. It is a way for us to share Inventor news, interesting information about successful Inventor customers and partners as well as tips and tricks. From time to time we’ll also use the blog to solicit feedback from users via surveys. This blog is hosted by Garin Gardiner our Technical Marketing Manager.
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CTRL your Trim!
March 30, 2009 11:41 PMby Garin Gardiner
Many of you liked one of my recent posts concerning not needing to trim overlapping profiles in a 2D sketch. Since it was all about not using the trim command, I decided to post a tip around using the Trim and Extend commands to your advantage. As I have mentioned in the past, I was a long time AutoCAD user and still carry some of that baggage around with me (for good or bad). I have always liked the Trim / Extrude commands in AutoCAD which allows you to pre-select things like the cutting edge when trimming. There is a trick to make the Trim and Extend commands in Inventor feel much the same way as AutoCAD if you miss your old workflows.
In this case I have I want to extend the line on the left, to the vertical edge to the right. Typically you would select extend command and select the the line 6 times to extend it incrementally over to the right. Well there's a better way!
Once you enter the Extend command hold down the CTRL command to select the far right edge of the line you want to extend to. Now you can select the vertical line to extend it to the vertical edge with one click!
This also works for Trim. Enter into the Trim command and select just the lines that will participate in the trim. From there you can select the portion you want to trim without having to do that incremental trim.
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Official Autodesk Inventor Podcast Episode 34 - Inventor 2010 Preview (Layout Design and Assembly Analysis)
March 25, 2009 01:40 PMby Garin Gardiner
It's been a few weeks since I posted my first podcast around what's new in Inventor 2010. There is way too much to show in a few podcasts but I intend on having probably 4 podcasts around the main enhancements to Inventor. This episode we will discuss Layout Design and Assembly Level Analysis. I think you will find some great nuggets here and look forward to hearing what you think about the new version.
This is the second of several episodes I will post around 2010 so stayed tuned.
I have been looking forward to both sketch level layout design as well as being able to run an FEA analysis on an assembly. Great stuff but I might be a little bias
Don't forget to head over to iTunes if you want to subscribe and download these automatically when a new episode is available.
Zune
Don't forget to leave feedback by adding a comment to this post or email me.1 Comment | Add CommentIn In the Machine > Tips, Podcast, Autodesk Inventor Professional, Announcements, Autodesk Inventor
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Friday Pictures
March 23, 2009 11:58 AMby Garin Gardiner
Those of you that spend much time on the Inventor Discussion Group, you are probably already aware of the informal Friday Pictures that several of you post each week. for the rest of you that haven't seen some of the latest eye candy, take a look at some of the pictures that were posted last Friday. It is a great way to show off your work and I hope to start posting these each Monday.
Bill Bogan 
JD Mather 
Josh Petitt 
MarcoA
0 Comment | Add CommentIn In the Machine > Autodesk Inventor
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No need to Trim!
March 17, 2009 12:01 PMby Garin GardinerThe other day I was talking to one of our developers and as a side comment, he mentioned this little tip that I didn't know even existed. I was so excited that I showed it to a local User Group that same night and nobody there knew about it there either. I assumed this was one of those little nuggets that everybody but me already knew but I am discovering that isn't the case.
What is it you ask?
Have you ever created an overlapping profile and wanted to extrude just a portion of it although the "Select Other" wasn't able to select the portion you wanted?
I this case I want to extrude the portion of the profile where the circle and square overlap
In the past I would start the trim or break sketch tool to remove the other areas so I could get just the profile I wanted. In most cases this was fine although in cases where I wanted to share the sketch for several features, using trim/break doesn't work very well. Here is where the great tip came in handy from the developer. If you place a sketch point at the intersections of where I would normally trim or or break, I can then enter the extrude dialog and select just that portion of the sketch.
This example I insert two points where the circle intersects the rectangle
Once the sketch points are in place, I can instantly use the inner portion of the profile!
6 Comments | Add CommentIn In the Machine > Inventor LT, Tips, Autodesk Inventor
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Official Autodesk Inventor Podcast Episode 33 - Inventor 2010 Preview
March 11, 2009 06:54 PMby Garin GardinerAfter my last podcast I received several emails about when I would post something for Inventor 2010. Wait no longer to get your first shot of some of the new tools for Consumer Products such as Plastic Parts, Multi Body Support and integration with Alias Studio.
This is the first of several episodes I will post around 2010 so stayed tuned.
Just because I mention these are for Consumer Products there are many great uses for these tools other than for consumer products. Multi Body can be used in almost any environment to be sure to try it out when you get your hands on it.
Don't forget to head over to iTunes if you want to subscribe and download these automatically when a new episode is available.
Zune
Don't forget to leave feedback by adding a comment to this post or email me.0 Comment | Add CommentIn In the Machine > Autodesk Inventor, Announcements, News, Podcast
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Inventor iLogic product add-in for Subscription Customers
March 10, 2009 06:05 PMby Garin Gardiner
Autodesk is pleased to offer Autodesk® Inventor® Subscription customers the Inventor iLogic™ Extension 2009 as an add-in for the Autodesk Inventor 2009 family of software products.
Inventor iLogic extends and enhances your parametric design capabilities, automates tedious design tasks, and adds higher levels of design intelligence to your digital prototypes. With easy-to-use authoring capabilities and an intuitive user interface, Inventor iLogic integrates seamlessly with Inventor 2009.
By integrating Inventor iLogic into Inventor 2009, users are able to:
•Create “smart” parts and assemblies that define multiple product configurations and make automatic updates in real-time based on logical relationships between design parameters such as mass, volume, dimensional values, material types, feature and component activation or suppression, patterns, and more.•Simplify rules-based design with easy-to-use, clickable tools that any Inventor user working at the individual and engineering workgroup level can use – even those with little or no programming experience.•Automate tedious design tasks by adding higher than ever before levels of intelligence to your digital prototypes.Exclusively available to Autodesk Inventor Subscription customers as English software only, Inventor iLogic can be installed and used in any language version of the Autodesk Inventor 2009 family of software products. Please direct questions about Inventor iLogic to ilogic@autodesk.com or to your Autodesk Authorized Value Added reseller.
Log in to Subscription Center and download Inventor iLogic today, or to try out the hands-on tutorial and learn more about Inventor iLogic and how to use it.
0 Comment | Add CommentIn In the Machine > Announcements, Autodesk, Autodesk Inventor, Autodesk Inventor Professional, Tips, News
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Pattern Along Path
March 6, 2009 01:52 PMby Garin GardinerAs many of you have probably already discovered, many of my tips come from questions I get each week about how to do things in Inventor. This one actually comes from a fellow Autodesker and I figured if he struggled with this one that it was prime for a blog post. I will call him Joe since he wanted me to keep his identity unknown (I think he was a little embarrassed he didn't know this one).
What Joe was trying to do was pattern stair treads around a spiral staircase. There is an option that is a little hidden to give him the results he was looking for. Take a look at the setup.
When patterning the tread around along a path you will notice that the tread stays parallel to the original one instead of rotating around.
If you expand the Rectangular Pattern dialog you will notice an option for orientation - change it to Direction to see it update the pattern as I (and Joe) would want for this staircase.
Thanks
RobJoe, enjoy your weekend!
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