Multi-level assemblies with motion

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by DampRobot

Do you know of this works in SolidWorks too? I used to be an Inventor user, but our CAD mentor had us switch over to SW last year...

For what it's worth, I usually plan on putting everything I want to move at once in one assembly. Either that or (to test a few configurations, not motion) moving one subassembly, then saving it, and then going into the main assembly and hitting update

Nice subassembly organization to save time and keep things clean isn't conducive to handling motion the way you do. I used to do it this way, until someone on chief tipped me off to the solution.

-Right click on a subassembly in the feature tree, and go to "component properties".
-Near the bottom right, there is "Solve as". Set this to flexible.

Enjoy cleaning organization and all the movement you want!

I find keeping every movable part movable annoying, so I often set things back to rigid when I'm done analyzing motion.

A bit further off topic, sometimes when a design is closer to done, I'll mate the systems into all their possible positions and have each as a configuration at the top level. So you have a "load", "shoot", etc... configuration that shows all systems in their appropriate location.