Desktop Engineering (DTE) Blog

Desktop Engineering Blog

Alex Fernandes

Alex is a graduate MSc in Mechanical Engineering from IST-Technical University of Lisbon. His thesis was based on ultrasonic metal welding research performed in a technical partnership programme with DELPHI Automotive Systems. He started a PhD programme that was developed between IST, DELPHI and Aalto University, Helsinki. During his time with DELPHI Alex won a Delphi Manufacturing Excellence Award, in 2009. Using CATIA to design components, he later tested for production release, showed him a new passion, CAD design. After three years of daily usage Alex achieved Certified Instructor status by Dassault Systemes, his latest achievement. Alex has a natural talent for teaching and is a passionate designer.
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Recent Posts

Modelling methodology in CATIA V5 Article Series

Round-up

Over the past couple of months, we published a series of articles related to Modelling Methodology in CATIA V5.

The presented articles discuss the entire process for parts that are mainly prismatic in shape, with single body.

Multi-body and surface based modelling will be covered in future articles.

To recap, the topics and articles links are below:

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling methodology in CATIA V5 - Part 7

Additional Rules

This is the seventh article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will discuss additional rules to be considered when defining part files. This article closes the main set of modelling methodology for prismatic geometry driven parts, with single body.

Figure 1-The Angle Bracket part - referred to in past articles on modelling methodology

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling methodology in CATIA V5 - Part 6

Defining features

This is the sixth article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will discuss methodology and rules to be considered when defining features.

We will use the same example component, introduced in previous articles, called Angle bracket.

We discussed, in article 5, the solid modelling stage in detail; the PartBody container and how to organize features into different groups, considering their function in the part. We defined group sequence, group rules and feature naming. With this in mind, we guaranteed that our part is editable.

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling methodology in CATIA V5 - Part 5

The modelling stage

This is the fifth article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will discuss the modelling stage in detail.

This is the second stage of the creation process; we already have all the elements defined in the Skeleton group, so now is the time to start modelling the solid geometry.

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling Methodology in CATIA V5 - Part 4

Defining sketches

This is the fourth article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will discuss methodology and rules for sketch definition.

 

Figure 1 - The skeleton geometrical set

We will continue using the same Angle bracket example part, introduced in previous articles.

In previous articles, we have discussed the skeleton and its internal structure and organization. The subsets are numbered so that the order of the subsets coincides with the order of element insertion, thus we can work sequentially inside the skeleton.

By this point, to start our article, we will consider that we have imported all necessary external data into our part and created all the necessary reference geometry.

All these elements are to be inserted in geometrical sets:

1. Input data and 2. Reference geometry.

As visible in figure-1, sketches are to be inserted inside geometrical sets:

3. Main sketches and 4. Auxiliary sketches, both inside the Skeleton.

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling Methodology in CATIA V5 - Part 3

The Design Phase

This is the third article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will discuss the design stage in detail.

This is the first stage of the creation process; we will create a geometrical set called Skeleton and we will insert additional geometrical sets inside it. The component’s design intent is captured in the Skeleton geometrical set. Skeleton methodology has been around for quite some time now and the idea is to have to model’s main geometrical elements editable from one single location in the part’s specification tree. This also means that we will have many elements inserted inside this geometrical set, so for this reason we will rename them and organize them according to a specific logic.

Figure 1 - The Angle Bracket part

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling Methodology in CATIA V5 - Part 2

Specification Tree Organization

This is the second article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will discuss how to organize the specification tree in a part file during the creation process.

1.  Avoid cryptic specification trees

In figure 1, you can compare the difference between; a part with an organized specification tree (left side) versus a part with mixed modelling specification tree (right side). Both files present the same end geometry, considering the initial parameters specified for the design.

Figure 1 - Organised specification tree vs mixed modelling versions of Angle Bracket part

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Modelling methodology in CATIA V5

 Part creation process

This is the first article of a series concerning how to implement and use modelling methodology in CATIA V5.

In this article, we will cover the creation process for a part file. We will break it down in two stages; design stage and modelling stage.

Let us imagine you need to edit a part, changing some parameters in existing features, and that the geometry update process fails after modification. Models that fail after editing are brittle and they work fine if you do not edit them!

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Topics: Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA