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Basic Concepts of Combining Parts | 445
Basic Concepts of Combining Parts
In Mechanical Desktop
®
the parametric Boolean capabilities for combining
parts provide a combination of modeling flexibility and convenience. To
combine two parts, you identify which part you want to use as the base part
and make it active. Then, you position the toolbody part on the base part,
using the
MOVE or ROTATE command or assembly constraints. You use
AMCOMBINE to cut, join, or intersect the toolbody part with the base part.
You can combine as many toolbodies with a base part as you like, but the
base part and the toolbody must be instances of different parts. In other
words, you cannot combine a part with an instance of itself.
Because the end result is a single part, you can create combined parts in Single
Part mode. If you place more than one part in a part file, the additional parts
automatically become unconsumed toolbodies.
To combine a toolbody with a base part in an Assembly file, both parts must
exist in the same active assembly.
When you create a complex part, the complete definitions of the toolbodies
are stored in the assembly model file. To avoid creating files that are unnec-
essarily complex, use simple parts as toolbodies. In the following illustration,
the highlighted parts are used to cut a slot. The resultant parts look identical,
but the one created with the complex toolbody part consumes more disk
space. Feature editing operations, such as cutting a slot, take longer.
With Mechanical Desktop, you can create toolbody parts that contain other
toolbody parts. These are called nested toolbodies. However, you may be able
to achieve the same result without nesting toolbodies.
simple toolbody partcomplex toolbody part