Thanks for your comments Al. Its been almost 10 years since I "worked for a living" (Piping Design) and for me Isogen is a big part of the new job.
AutoPLANT uses the component methods (VB programs) to write the PCF text files. You can open and read them (using notepad) and see that its a relatively simple file format. In this example taken from a PCF file you see a pipe followed by a split point at one end of the pipe. Of course the design would never see this stuff but would simply place the stop sign in the model.
PIPE
END-POINT 219.770 191.043 141.313 6 BW
END-POINT 219.770 130.497 141.313 6 BW
FABRICATION-ITEM
ITEM-CODE PIP6
WEIGHT 18.970
UNIQUE-COMPONENT-IDENTIFIER AT_DYEMX6AP_0
PIPING-SPEC CS150
ISO-SPLIT-POINT
CO-ORDS 219.770 191.043 141.313
I'm pretty sure CADWorx also writes to this format since this is the file that Isogen reads to draw the Iso. Not sure how you can control what CADWorks writes to the file but maybe their support team can help you there.
thank you rich. YOu clearly know a lot.
what is interesting here is that you are using Autoplant which has more
bells and whistles than
CAdworx which we are using. I will send these notes to COADE the authors of
cadworx.
(1) we dont have the option to use "isometric stop signs"
(2) not familiar with these switches but I'll take a look..(sounds again
like autoplant options)
(3) again we dont create pcf files. These are an autoplant animal. We tried
doing the weld thing in isogen and it came out very different from the
example provided. (more training and exp requd obviously)
I wasnt aware that isogen took the data from the "pcf file" from AUTOPLANT. Is that the case? (Its a rather messy animal from my experience).
I agree this is the experience and right judgement that clients are buying. If its so worthless let them try. I see a lot of smart guys on this website. Its the same with other tools.
Altecheng@shaw.ca
001(780)465-9762
fax/Msg(780)465-9762
-----Original Message-----
From: Rich Scotti [mailto:Rich@Scotti.com]
Sent: Thursday, October 21, 2004 3:37 PM
To: PipingDesign@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [PipingDesign] Piping spool number and isometric break
Which piping design system do you use? Each one features a different interface. Easily half of Isogen is actually the 3d piping modeling system and its interface. additional comments below marked with [RJS]
>> can you tell us where the command is to tell isogen where to break. We
have not been able to find this option.
[RJS] In the PCF file these are written as: ISO-SPLIT-POINT <coord>
Each CAD system will likely have its own implementation of how to populate
these. In AutoPLANT, for example, you would place "Isometric stop signs" at
the split points.
>> we have been exporting selected pipes into A2 size , then shrinking down
to fit into our a3 template Otherwise isogen creates too many drawings with
only too shorty little "pups" per dwg. Not a great workaround. I like your
"select the break points" , but where are the options/commands to do that.??
[RJS] Have you tried configuring the drawing density (switch 38) to push
more data on each sheet? You can also configure margins(switches 10-13),
text sizes (switch 27) dimension standout, and even the length of fittings.
These are set in the options file too.
>>>Also are you saying isogen will creat the welder flags for each weld for the weld mapping. I didnt know isogen would do that. I agree wait to the end, and we have done that separately & manually at end of generating isos. [RJS] Isogen will assign weld and/or numbers for you if you like or you can pass them to Isogen in the PCF file. Either way you can output a weld summary to the drawing or to a text file. You can even format the weld report with any/all data you passed in the PCF file using a weld definition file.
There are so many ways to operate Isogen that a big part of a projects success is a well thought out Isogen stratgy.
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