Merging Using Component Operations
A Merge feature can also be created from the > > or Cut Out menu. Specify the component to which the Merge feature will be added, and then select the component to be merged into the first one.
Merging by Reference
A merge by reference creates an external reference between two objects similar to the Merge features produced by using > . In this type of relationship the merged part is dependent on information in the referenced part. You can include names of datum entities from the reference model in the merged model. Layers and colors are automatically included. You can also create an external Merge feature that does not require placement in the same assembly to determine the orientation of the new Merge feature.
The following rules apply for using the Reference option:
• The system reflects all changes to the referenced part in the merged part.
• You can replace a merged part by a Family Table instance.
• If the merged part placement is dependent on geometry that was deleted or suppressed, the system places the merged part using the last successful placement. A warning is displayed and feature placement cannot be updated. When the geometry reference is resumed, parametric placement is restored.
• If a reference part has been deleted or renamed, or the part does not exist in the current directory, the merged part is retrieved but is not regenerated. (In Resolve Mode if you attempted and failed to regenerate, choose Quick Fix from the FIX MODEL menu. Then click Suppress from the QUICK FIX menu to suppress the corresponding merge part.) To resolve the situation, locate and restore the referenced part.
• If a merged part is active in the current session, you can rename the referenced parts by clicking > > . The merged part updates its references. You cannot delete the referenced parts from memory.
• The system copies cosmetic feature geometry in the target part to the source part.
• Surface features that are outside a model show up in the model when a cutout operation is performed on components in an assembly.
• When saving a merged part, or defining a user-defined feature, the system automatically saves the parts referenced by the merged part.
Merging Using Copy
When you merge using the Copy command in the OPTIONS menu, you can modify all features of the merged part. The following rules apply:
• Except for placement references, you cannot reference features within a merged part to features outside that part. Therefore, when you modify the scheme of a merged part, only those features within one merge member are displayed in the window.
• The system adds the features of the target part (first selection) to the end of the feature list of the source part (second selection). As a result, when you set a feature of the target part as read-only, all the features of the source part become read-only as well.
• Features that have been merged using Copy cannot reference features that are outside of the merge group. If you try to merge a component with a part that has an imported feature, the Copy command is dimmed in the OPTIONS menu.
• If the first feature of a merge part is a user-defined feature or the result of using Copy in the Component menu, the system automatically incorporates all associated features into the merge part.
Including Datums in Merge Features
When you merge by reference, the No Datums and Copy Datums commands are available in the OPTIONS menu. You cannot modify included datums. When you cutout by reference, the system excludes datums. When you choose No Datums, the system excludes only datum planes from the merge. It merges datum axes, datum points, and coordinate systems.
When you merge using Copy, the system always copies datums, and they are added to the Merge feature.