In planning for shape change, you may need to build your parts differently than you might normally build them in Creo Parametric. To understand this principle more clearly, consider the following example of a proposed shelf bracket design:

This bracket is made of steel and supports a bookshelf that rests on two rods. The bracket ears and vertical face slide into a die-cast slot in the shelf post. Note that the support holes accept a rod with a predetermined diameter.

If you were trying to determine the best design for this part, you would probably want to optimize the shape for the lowest mass that would support a specified weight. In this case, you might want to change the following aspects of the design:

However, due to external restrictions like the support rod diameter, you cannot change the following three aspects of the design:

If you had no interest in optimizing this part, you might design the bracket as a single plate with a uniform thickness and treat the body of the plate as a single Creo Parametric feature. However, because you plan to optimize for mass, you want Creo Simulate to be able to change any aspect of the design that reduces the mass. This objective can affect the way you develop your part in Creo Parametric.

For example, one of the aspects directly tied to mass is part thickness. Because the bracket ear shape and part height cannot change, you cannot alter the part thickness if you develop the bracket as a single plate. Instead, you might choose to treat the body of the plate as two separate features—a rear plate and a shelf plate, as shown below:

This approach lets you maintain a predefined thickness for the rear plate while allowing Creo Simulate to vary the thickness of the shelf plate.

Return to Strategy: Planning Ahead for Shape Changes.