Create and modify the frame generator

00:09

This course will focus on Building Structures with the Frame Generator tool.

00:16

The Frame Generator tool is located within the Design tab of the Inventor Assembly environment.

00:23

It is located alongside the other Design Accelerator tools.

00:27

The Frame Generator tool allows you to Insert Frame components from the Content Center.

00:35

These will be standard-sized shapes such as square tubing, pipes, I-beams,

00:42

channel, and all sorts of different cross-sectional shapes.

00:46

Once they've been added to an existing skeleton, they can then be given different end treatments like notches, miters.

00:55

You can even Trim and Extend, so they line up as you need to.

01:02

You can also automatically update your frame and the individual member length by updating the base skeleton.

01:10

So each of these frames will have either a sketch or a surface body that drives the overall shape.

01:17

And as you update that skeleton, the frame and its components will update to match.

01:23

And that includes all of your end treatments as well.

01:27

This makes it really easy to really quickly manipulate a very complex welded frame assembly.

01:34

And none of these frame assemblies require constraints,

01:39

so you don't need to manually place a line and constraint each individual part.

01:49

So when you're working in an assembly, you can insert your frame members in a variety of different ways.

01:54

You can actually add them between two sketch points, Work Points or Vertices.

02:01

You can also choose a line from a sketch, either a 2D or a 3D sketch. And that line does not necessarily need to be straight.

02:11

It can also be an Arc or an Ellipse or Spline.

02:16

And you can also add in frame members onto existing edges of a surface body, a solid body.

02:24

And once again, this could be a Straight line, a Spline or an Arc that you're selecting from that body.

02:34

So once you've chosen your Input Geometry, whether that is a point to point, or an existing Line sketch,

02:42

you can then decide what frame member you'd like to add onto that line.

02:46

So you can choose from a standardized list that is pulled from the Inventor Content Center.

02:52

So you'll see a category which is going to be the type of shape.

02:57

You can then choose a Standard, for instance ANSI is shown here, and then you can choose from that Standard Family.

03:04

So for instance, Square, Tubing, Pipes, Tees, I-Beams,

03:10

all of those existing shapes from that library can be pulled along with their size.

03:14

So shown here is a 2 x 2 x 1/8 inch thick square box tube.

03:21

One thing to note with these frame members is the material here is shown as Mild Steel.

03:26

That is going to be the default material from the Content Center.

03:30

However, you can override the material for each frame member if it's something besides a simple Mild Steel,

03:36

and that will be populated through to the design, the individual part, as well as the Bill of Materials.

03:42

You can also change the appearance if you don't want to look like the material.

03:46

If it needs to be a certain color, you can do so here as well, just like when you're creating a part.

03:51

And then the last thing that you can decide to do is if you'd like to change the Orientation.

03:56

So the default Orientation will show up in the graphics window.

04:00

However, you can rotate about the center axis or about the geometry line that you've chosen.

04:08

So you can put in a rotational angle there and it will update in real-time in the graphics window.

04:13

So it makes it easy to see if you have that correct.

04:16

You can also choose a point to Rotate about,

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and then the Offset A and B is going to be essentially the X and Y direction relative to that rotational center.

04:27

So for instance, A might be forward and backwards along that line,

04:32

whereas B is going to be up or down in the Y-Axis from that Z direction.

04:39

You can also choose align to geometry and choose a new reference to align your shape too.

04:46

When you're done adding in your frames, make sure you select "Okay".

04:49

And then it will have you save the frame components into your working folder and give them a name if you'd like to.

05:00

There are several end treatment tools that are available in the Frame Generator environment.

05:05

These will show up on the ribbon with your frame tools in the Design Accelerator.

05:12

So the first one you'll see here is a Miter.

05:15

That would be if you'd like there to be essentially a 45 degree angle between the two frame members where they come together at a corner.

05:23

You can automatically create that Miter. You can also add in an offset if you'd like there to be a gap for tolerance or for welding.

05:32

You can add in a Notch, which will essentially cut out one frame member's profile from the other, so that it will fit in.

05:40

This is helpful when you're working with channel or I-beam, where you'd like to create that notch profile automatically.

05:46

You can also create custom notch profiles and save them to the Content Center library.

05:54

Corner joint is essentially going to cut one frame member back to the edge of the other frame member,

06:03

to make a nice 90 degree corner where you don't have any overlap.

06:07

So it'll cut one component and then extend the other to create that joint.

06:13

The Trim/Extend tool allows you to cut an existing member back to a selected face.

06:21

So Corner Joint, you select two parts and it cuts them and extends them as necessary.

06:28

The Trim/Extend tool has you choose a frame member, and then a plainer face that you'd like to trim that member back to,

06:37

and it will automatically do so. So the member will be shown in blue.

06:41

The trim face will be shown in yellow as they show in that image there. And that takes a little bit of practice to get used to.

06:51

And lastly, I'd like to just cover a few Expert Tips here.

06:56

When you start working with the Frame Generator, these insights can be super helpful.

06:60

So the first is that keep in mind that when you edit the skeleton model.

07:04

So if you edit the three dimensional or two dimensional sketch that you're working with,

07:10

or the surface body that you're using as a skeleton, when you change the dimensions of your skeleton, the frames automatically update.

07:18

So if you have a sketch and you increase the length, those members will increase their length and the end treatments will update as well.

07:27

And that will populate all the way through the assembly, and into the drawings and Bill of Materials as well. So it's all linked together.

07:34

You can also promote and demote frame members in the browser.

07:37

If you'd like to reorganize the subassemblies, or move a frame out of a subassembly into the top level assembly.

07:48

Keep in mind that even though you can apply frame members to a curve like a Ellipse or an Arc,

07:55

you can't insert frame members onto a closed curve, so a closed ellipse or a closed circle.

08:02

If that's required, you'll need to create the cross section, and then use the Sweep tool in the Part environment.

08:12

And then lastly, you can extract end treatments, for your frame members in the Bill of Materials and the parts list.

08:20

So you can take the length, the shape, the material as well as the end treatments,

08:27

from the assembly all the way into your drawing, Bill of Materials and parts list,

08:32

which can be super helpful when you're preparing it for manufacturing.

00:09

In this exercise, we will Create and Modify Frame Members using the Design Accelerator.

00:18

For this exercise, we will be working with the Mounting Frame assembly shown here.

00:23

You'll notice when you open up the assembly file that there is a component already in the browser on the left-hand side called Frame Sketch.

00:33

If you right-click and open this, you will notice that this is just a simple surface part that's been created.

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And this is what's called a skeleton.

00:43

So for any frame that you'd like to create with Autodesk inventor,

00:47

you need to create a base skeleton that's either a sketch or a surface like this, and then insert that part into a new assembly.

00:57

And then you can build the frame by inserting members on top of edges or points from that skeleton.

01:06

So to start building my frame, I'll first go to the "Design" tab,

01:10

and then I'll select "Insert Frame," and it opens up this dialog.

01:17

I'm going to start by creating the frame for the base of the structure. So you'll notice there's sort of three categories.

01:24

There is your Geometry, Frame Member and then Orientation.

01:29

For Geometry, you can choose an existing sketch line or the edge of a body or surface like it's shown here.

01:37

Right next to this, there's this option where you can turn on Specify frame location by two points.

01:44

By default, it is off. If I activate that notice, I can't choose a line anymore, but I can choose for instance,

01:51

two end points of a line, and it places a Frame Member between those points.

01:57

So that's helpful if you just have points that you're using to generate your frame, those can be sketch points or work points.

02:04

In this case, I already have an edge that I want to use. So I'm going to leave that option off so I can just choose lines.

02:13

Then I'll go down to this Frame Member section.

02:16

This is where I can change, for instance, the Category, if I wanted to filter by a specific shape, the Standard is the standard,

02:25

for instance, ANSI or ISO, and then for Family you have your subtype.

02:31

So within ANSI, I have all these different ANSI categories or families, and then the size below that.

02:39

So what I'm going to do for this base is I'm going to change the family to the ANSI MC /C - U-shape, which is a channel shape.

02:49

I'm going to use the 3 x 3.5 size with Mild, Steel as the material. And then I'll go ahead and select my first edge right here.

02:58

And I'm going to go ahead and select all four of these edges along the base. The channel should be facing to the sea faces outwards.

03:07

Then what I can do is I can change the position relative to the line I selected.

03:12

That's what these nine dots represent or these radio buttons.

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If I, for instance, choose the center radio button, it centers the shape so that the C is centered,

03:25

the cross-section is centered on that line as its Z-Axis.

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In this case, I want the frame to be positioned on the outside of the surface.

03:34

So to do that, I can choose this radio button right here, which positions it,

03:39

so that the edge represents the outside of where this cross section will lie.

03:46

So it will sort of create a boundary around those edges like that.

03:52

If I'd like to change the rotation I can do, so here. This would rotate about the Z-Axis.

03:59

So for instance, if I put in 90 all the frames rotate 90 degrees.

04:03

If you put in 0, it remains the same Offset A and B essentially represent your X,

04:09

and Y-Axis relative to the line that you selected, which is your Z.

04:14

So for Offset A, if I put in 2 inches, notice it moves them outwards.

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If I put in 2 inches for B, it moves them up.

04:26

And if you want to move them down, relative to that line, you would put in a negative value.

04:30

So -2 and you would move it down. So that is your X and Y relative to your Z.

04:36

In this case, we'll leave all of those blank.

04:38

I'll just select "Ok" to generate these C channel shapes, and then click "Ok" to save these files.

04:48

And now I should have those four frame members along the base of my frame.

04:54

So I will be adjusting the length and editing the end treatments for these frame components in the next exercise.

05:01

For now, I will continue by adding an additional Frame Members to complete the structure.

05:06

So I will start by selecting "Insert Frame" once again.

05:09

This time, I'm going to change the Family from C shape to ANSI AISC rectangular tube at the very top of the list.

05:18

My size, I'll use 2 x 1 x 1/8 inch tubing. I'm going to start by selecting this vertical edge of the frame shown here.

05:26

For position, I want it on the inside of the channel, but centered on the edge.

05:32

So I'll go ahead and select this option here, which moves it to the inside face of my base.

05:39

I can then click this green plus sign at the bottom of the dialog box.

05:43

This will apply my current Frame Member,

05:46

but it will reopen the dialog box and allow me to continue adding additional members of the same family.

05:52

So I'll click the plus sign, Click, "Ok".

05:56

And now I'll add the same shape to the opposite vertical edge. Again, I want it to rest on the inside of the tube.

06:03

So I'll go ahead and click this option here which moves it centered, but on the inside of that channel.

06:10

I can then hit the green plus sign again, which adds that Frame Member.

06:14

But now I can continue adding Frame Members for my angled edges. So I'll select this edge here.

06:21

For this, I want it centered on my channel, so I can create a clean miter down there.

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And then I want it on the outside of my vertical member. So as it's positioned there is correct.

06:35

So I'll click the green plus sign, click "Ok". And now I add my final vertical member here to the other side by clicking that.

06:43

And I will need to adjust the position here. It's not centered on my channel on the outside of my vertical member.

06:49

So I'll click this button right here which moves it out to the outside face of the vertical tube and centered on the channel at the bottom.

06:59

It should mirror the opposite side.

07:01

I can now click "Ok" And confirm my changes and it should look something like this when you're done with those selections there.

07:12

So now I'm ready to add my final three Frame Members to the top surface of this skeleton. So I'll select "Insert Frame" one more time.

07:20

This time, I'm going to go ahead and select this horizontal edge here, the end and then the opposite edge.

07:26

So those three edges right there should be selected For position, I'm going to go ahead and update this.

07:33

So that it is I want it at the top of my vertical Frame Member. So I click the top.

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But I also want it centered on that vertical Frame Member. So I'll hit the top left corner of that box.

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So now it's centered, and flush with the top of that tube. So it should look something like that.

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And then now I can go ahead and click, "Ok", to confirm those Frame Members and add them into my assembly.

08:04

If I want to get a clean look at the frame, I can right click on Frame Sketch, and turn the Visibility off.

08:12

Again, we're going to be adding end treatments in the next exercise, but it does look correct at this stage.

08:18

So I can go ahead and just click on "Save", which will save all of my components into my folder.

08:25

And now I can make adjustments if I need to. So the last thing I'm going to do is adjust the actual frame size.

08:33

I can do that by modifying the skeleton.

08:36

So the Frame Members, their lengths and positions are completely driven by the base skeleton.

08:43

So if I open up the Frame Sketch part file, by right clicking on it and selecting "Open".

08:50

If I make a change to this base skeleton, the Frame Members automatically update.

08:54

So I can select the "Parameters" tool at the top of my panel.

09:00

And then here where it says "Frame width 7 inches", I'm going to change that parameter to 10 inches, and select "Done".

09:09

I'll click "Save" and then close my part file.

09:13

Now to update this locally, I'll hit the little lightning bolt with the page at the top to do a local update.

09:21

And what you'll notice is it updated the width of the frame.

09:24

All of the Frame Members updated to match, but their orientation relative to one another remains the same.

09:29

So now I've increased the width to 10 inches. I can now click "Save" again, and my frame is ready for end treatments.

00:09

In this exercise, we will be reviewing the different End Treatments that can be used with the Frame Generator tool.

00:18

So now that we've finished adding in all of our Frame Members,

00:21

we can now start adding end treatments and joints between parts to create a nice clean frame that is ready for manufacturing.

00:31

So to start, I'm going to be adding in a few corner joints.

00:34

So the Corner Joint tool on the Frame panel up here allows you to choose two frame members.

00:43

And it will then create a corner between the two. So it'll essentially extend one, and trim the other back to create a 90 degree corner.

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Now, if the first selection you make, so if I choose this end piece here in yellow,

00:59

and then I choose this horizontal piece here shown in blue.

01:04

It's going to Extend the first selection, and then Trim the second selection.

01:11

If I made the selections in the opposite order. So I chose this part first, and then the end piece second.

01:18

Notice it extends the first and trims the second.

01:22

In this case, I want my original selection where I'm extending the end pieces to make those longer.

01:28

And then I'll choose this horizontal piece here. And you can actually choose an additional part at the same time.

01:35

If I choose the lengthwise channel on the other side, what it'll do is it'll Extend the end and then Trim both of the sides.

01:44

You can also add in gaps here, for offset one and two. In this case, I want it to be line to line.

01:52

So I'll select "Ok" to confirm that Corner Joint. So it created two corner joints, one on each side.

01:58

And I can repeat that process on the other side of my frame.

02:02

So if I select Corner Joint again, I'll choose the end piece and then the two lengthwise pieces and select "Ok".

02:10

And now I have a nice clean corner at each of those intersections of those channels.

02:19

Now, the next tool that's going to come in handy is what's called the "Trim/Extend" tool.

02:25

What the "Trim/Extend" tool does is it allows you to choose an actual face and this can be a flat face.

02:31

It can also be a curved face that is going to be your tool.

02:35

And then your frame members you select, you can select multiple at the same time when using this tool.

02:42

All of those frame members will be trimmed back to the face that you've selected.

02:47

So for instance, for my tool, if I choose the top face of this channel right here and then for my frame member,

02:56

I select this angled tube right here, it cuts it at an angle to match that face.

03:03

What's great about this tool is for Frame Member,

03:06

I can choose multiple members, so I can choose this other angled frame member, and they're both trimmed to that same face.

03:14

I can then select "Ok" to confirm, and it will trim both of those at the same time.

03:20

Now, what you want to keep in mind when you're creating end treatments is if you ever need to remove an end treatment,

03:27

you can just go to that individual frame member.

03:29

So for instance, I could go to one of these angled frame members in the browser on the left hand side.

03:35

And if I expand it with the plus sign,

03:38

you'll notice that "Trim/Extend" operation shows up underneath the individual Frame Member.

03:47

So that's one way you can access those.

03:49

The other thing you can do is you'll notice under frame, if you hit the frame drop down menu,

03:57

there's an option to remove end treatments.

04:00

And I can then choose individual frame members that I'd like to remove end treatments from,

04:05

and it gives me a preview of what will be resolved after that treatment's been removed.

04:10

So that's another way to locate end treatments that you've added in.

04:15

So if I take a look at the upper portion of this frame, you'll notice I'll need a few more end treatments,

04:22

to resolve the interaction between these parts.

04:25

I'm going to use the "Trim/Extend" tool. Once again, for my angle members.

04:30

This time, I'll select the top face of the frame.

04:33

I want all of these components, all these frames to end along the same plane.

04:38

So I'll choose that top face, and for frame members, I'll choose both of the angled parts.

04:43

So it cuts that at a angle to create a flat surface. I'll select, "Ok".

04:49

And those have now been resolved,

04:52

for the three tubes running along the top here, I'm going to use a variety of options.

04:60

The first is going to be a "Trim/Extend" once again.

05:05

This time, I'll be trimming back these two horizontal pieces to the vertical members.

05:12

So I'll select this face here, and then for frame members, I'll select these two to trim that back, so that I can weld at that joint.

05:21

And then I can select "Ok" to confirm that change. So I've used "Trim/Extend" several times here.

05:28

And now I'm ready to resolve the final interaction between these three tubes. This will be done using what's called a Miter.

05:35

So I will select "Miter" from my Frame panel. And miter only requires you to select frame members. You can't select surfaces here.

05:44

So I'll select these two frame members. I'm going to add the third as well. So I'll select all three.

05:51

It will create a miter between all those intersections, which is essentially a angled cut that can then be added between.

05:58

Right here you'll see an offset value. If you put in 0, it will be line to line.

06:03

In this case, I'm going to put an offset value of 0.05 to create a slight offset between those members for tolerance,

06:11

and then I can select "Ok" to confirm that Miter.

06:14

And you'll notice instead of a Corner Joint,

06:16

it's a 45 degree angle cut between the two with a 50 thousandths of an inch gap at each intersection.

06:24

So now I've added in all the end treatments, I need to create a nice clean joint between all the frame members.

06:32

So the last tool that I will need for this frame is going to be the "Lengthen/Shorten" tool.

06:37

If I activate that tool, what this allows me to do is choose a Frame Member,

06:41

and then extend its length in a variety of different directions.

06:45

So just like the Extrude tool in Autodesk Inventor, I can offset the default direction flipped, symmetric or asymmetric.

06:54

In this case, if I choose this Frame Member and then I type in "2 inches", it extends it to the default direction.

07:02

Flipped would be 2 inches from the top, symmetric would be 2 inches in each direction.

07:07

Then an asymmetric allows me to type in a value for each side. So the default direction is what I want here.

07:13

I'm going to extend this down to the base, which is actually going to be 1.5 inches. So I'll type in 1.5.

07:20

That should extend that frame member down to the base of my channel.

07:25

I can then confirm this by hitting the green plus sign, and I'll do it to the other vertical member as well.

07:31

So I'll click the plus sign to apply. I'll then choose the other vertical member.

07:37

And this one because the orientation is flipped, I'll need to use the flipped command,

07:43

so that it adds 1.5 inches to the other side to match.

07:46

I can then click "Ok".

07:48

And now both those frame members have been lengthened to the bottom of the frame,

07:53

but it doesn't affect any of the other relationships, and I don't have to update any constraints or anything like that.