Working with Configurable CAD Documents
Configurable products are special Windchill product structure types and CAD structure types designed to include one or more solutions of an options set defined for the structure. They are part of a Windchill strategy to allow companies to deliver products by adding optional features and components to a base model or a generic platform.
When configurable CAD assemblies are associated to configurable product structures, options and option sets can be passed to CAD documents from the associated part during the “reverse build” process (that is, when a CAD structure is built from the part structure.)
Depending on your case and your design process, you may start your work on a configurable structure in Creo Parametric or in Windchill. The following use case examples give a high-level summary of the steps involved. For more detailed information on creating and modifying configurable assemblies in Creo Parametric, see the Creo Parametric Help Center. For more information on configurable product structures in Windchill, see Setting up Configurable Product Structures.
Example of a Top-Down Configuration Approach: From a Configurable Product Structure to a Configurable CAD Structure
In this scenario, you start with a configurable part structure in Windchill, which has an associated configurable CAD structure in Creo Parametric.
In Windchill:
1. Create an option pool to contain all required options, choices, and rules to configure the supported product variations.
2. Create an option set that contains the relevant options, choices, and rules for the configurable product.
3. Include configurable modules in the structure to capture variations in design solutions.
4. Assign choices to child parts of configurable modules in the part structure.
5. Update the CAD structure from the configurable product structure.
The choices assigned to parts in Windchill are propagated to the corresponding CAD objects in Creo Parametric.
6. Configure the part structure to generate a product variant and validate your selections. Save the variant specification and the product variant.
7. Preview the configurable CAD structure.
In Creo Parametric:
1. Open and check out the configurable product (an overloaded assembly with all optional components) and review the placement of configurable modules.
2. If changes have been made, check in the configurable product.
3. Configure the product using a variant specification.
4. Check in the variant product (variant top-level assembly).
5. Associate the product variant assembly (created in Creo Parametric) with the product variant part structure (created in Windchill).
Example of a Bottom-Up Configuration Approach: From a Configurable CAD Structure to a Configurable Product Structure
In this example, you start with a configurable product in Creo Parametric that are used to generate an associated configurable product structure in Windchill.
In Creo Parametric:
1. Open a configurable product in Creo Parametric and review its configurable modules.
2. Upload the configurable product, so that the enterprise options set is available in Creo Parametric.
3. Assign the choices to the dependents of the configurable modules in Creo Parametric.
4. From Creo Parametric, check in the configurable product to Windchill to build the corresponding part structure in Windchill. During the checkin, the system generates associations between CAD documents and parts in Windchill.
In Windchill:
1. Define options and choices in an option pool.
2. Create and assign an option set to a top-level item in the configurable product structure in Windchill, or to the context of the configurable product.
3. If desired, designate the top-level part in the configurable product structure as the end item.
4. Assign or modify choices to parts where variability is required.
5. Configure the product to generate a product variant and the corresponding variant specification.
6. Using the Compare tool, compare the two structures: the CAD structure versus the part structure. In the compare dual structure browser, build the structure to propagate the choice assignments on parts to the corresponding CAD documents.
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When comparing configurable part structures to configurable CAD structures (Compare to CAD Structure), a Choices tab is displayed, showing the Choices available for a listed Option Name. (The Choices tab only appears in the standalone browser.) When comparing configurable CAD assemblies to configurable part structures (Compare to Part Structure), an Options tab is added to the window, displaying the Choices available for a listed Option Name. (The Options tab only appears in the standalone browser.)
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In Creo Parametric:
1. Open the configurable product in Creo Parametric.
2. Review the choice assignment and update as needed. If there are no changes to the choice assignment, apply the variant specification generated in Windchill.
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If you have made changes to a choice assignment, you need to check in the CAD structure to propagate the changes to Windchill. Once in Windchill, you can configure the product structure to update the variant and the variant specification.
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3. Check in the configurable product.
4. Generate a product variant.
5. Check in the product variant to Windchill and auto-create a part structure for the variant.
In Windchill:
• Verify the newly created variant structure by comparing CAD and part structures in the compare dual structure browser.
Additional Considerations for Configurable Assemblies and Product Structures
The following information is applicable to configurable assemblies.
• In Windchill, the creation of a configurable CAD document requires an appropriate template to be set up.
• During the New CAD Document action, the ATO attributes for Configurable, Collapsible, and Min_Required, Max_allowed are created for configurable CAD documents. No additional user interface is presented in New CAD Document page, so the result is that the proper CAD document (configurable product or configurable module) is created based on the template created.
• The term “configurable module” refers to an assembly that has multiple options, but uses only one option when used in a variant, whereas the term “configurable product” refers to a configurable assembly (in Creo Parametric) or a configurable product structure (in Windchill) that has multiple potential solutions.
• A top-level configurable part should be designated as an end item.
• Auto-associated parts searched or created for configurable CAD assemblies must be configurable parts. If a matching part is found and it is a variant part, it is not shown in the user interface. You should create a new configurable part for association.
• When attempting to edit associations, be aware that object subtypes must be consistent.
• During the Save As operation of Update Parents, be aware that a standard assembly cannot contain a configurable assembly.
• Design in context functionality is disabled for configurable assemblies.
• Configurable products saved to projects do not provide access to options and option sets.
• To ensure that choices assigned on dependents of a configurable model in Creo Parametric are passed to the associated part structure, choose their configurable module as owner during choice assignment.