A Knowledgebase for all Die Designers…

It is very surprising to me that more tool and die companies don’t work with part numbers as the file name as opposed to the name of the part (the description, really) as the file name. I think the reason they don’t is because when most companies start out using 3D CAD, they start by naming the file “Die Block.sldprt” because that just seems more natural than just a number, and that is why some of them still do it this way years later. Also, it is intimidating (at first) to look at a folder full of numbers as file names as opposed to a folder full of “names” as file names. But once you are used to this, it is intimidating to look at a folder full of names as opposed to orderly numbers.

Of course the rest of the world works with part numbers typically rather than names. For example: If you buy anything at all for your home or car or whatever, and you need to order a new part, you look at the diagram of parts and most of the time you look at the balloon that is pointing to the component you need and look to see that this balloon is pointing to part number 12345 or whatever and you order a 12345. Or perhaps there is simply a part number being called out with a leader.

I believe there are two really significant benefits to using a part number (such as 17033-006 where 10733- is the project number or job number and 006 is the part number) for the file name rather than a descriptive name:
Benefit #1:
Many if not most dies cannot be designed fast enough for managment - they want to get steel on the floor and start cutting… So there is typically a problem because the BOM is not done yet and so you don’t know what the detail number is going to be, assuming you want your balloons in the correct order, etc, but of course you’d like the steel you order to be identified in some way. Using a part number allows you to order material based on the job # and part # combination and this part number is determined the minute before the designer puts the part into the assembly. So even if the part isn’t finished yet, you know what size it is and what kind of material, etc…
Benefit #2:
Back when we were using 2D, it was a major pain to have each detail on it’s own drawing – this often meant having each detail drawing as its own file. But today, with 3D and in particular with Logopress3, it is far easier to have each detail on its own drawing and being its own file. In addition, with all parametric modelers, including SolidWorks, each part file is its own separate file and these separate files go into an assembly. So it is much easier to locate these files in a folder or directory if they are in some sort of order. Giving the files a part number rather than a descriptive name brings this order to Windows Explorer and this way the CNC CAM operators and the WEDM operators and everyone else can find the files much more easily, as you can see from the picture below.

Benefit #3:
Having sheet numbers is just not necessary anymore in most cases, unless you need to keep doing it because “We’ve always done it that way“. We are creatures of habit, and sometimes this is the reason we do still do things like we did years ago. Instead of sheet numbers, many folks just use the part number of the part as the “sheet number”, so to speak. It’s not actually called the sheet number because you don’t look for sheet 22, you look for part number XYZ…

I would encourage you to look at the possible benefits of using part numbers as file names rather than the description of the part for the file name. I will detail instructions for an easy method of doing this using Logopress3 in the next post or two.

General tips & tricks for all, LP3 How-To's for users

At some point you may run across a scenario when you try to access a help file within a program, but the help file doesn’t open. Typically you will get a screen similar to the one below saying “Navigation to the web page was canceled” (Windows 7) or “Action canceled” (XP). I believe that this typically happens when you get this help file from somewhere other than a standard installation of a program, and this is Microsoft’s way of protecting you.

What you need to do is navigate in Windows Explorer to the location that the help file is located in, such as below for example.

You then need to right click on the help file and select Properties. Then, on the General tab, select the Unblock button towards the bottom right and then hit apply and then OK.

Now the help file should appear when you try to access it from within your program.

As a side note, some help files can be accessed by double clicking on the help file itself from within Windows Explorer, and others cannot. Some can only be accessed from within the program they written for.

General tips & tricks for all, LP3 Warning messages, Windows tips & tricks

Ditto is a great program for increasing productivity, regardless of what you are using it for. Even simply for filling out forms or whatever, I use it often.

Haven’t you found yourself wanting to copy something to the clipboard by using Ctrl+C and then realizing – “Wait, I also need to copy that, but I can only copy one thing at a time. Nuts!” That’s where Ditto comes in. The picture below is a great example of this. I knew I was going to write this post and I knew I wanted to paste the web address in here as far as where to get Ditto and I also wanted to copy their description of it into here. So I simply used Ctrl+C on both things. Then when I ‘m ready to use one or the other (or any of the last several items I’d copied to the clipboard) I simply press the default key combination to bring up the Ditto box which is Ctrl+~. (That’s the control key plus the key to the left of the number 1 key, and as you may remember from a previous post, this ~ is a tilde.) Here’s a picture of the box that pops up:

Ditto is a free open source program that is very tiny and loads with Windows. I’ve been using it since Windows XP and now use it with Windows 7 Professional and have had no issues at all. You can get it here:
http://ditto-cp.sourceforge.net/index.php

It is extremely simple to install – just use the default options. All you need to remember is to let it start when Windows starts and that way Ditto captures all clipboard entries. Then all you need to remember is that the hotkey to open Ditto so that you can select one of the entries from the list is Ctrl+~. That’s it!

Here’s the official description from the Ditto web site:
Ditto is an extension to the standard windows clipboard. It saves each item placed on the clipboard allowing you access to any of those items at a later time. Ditto allows you to save any type of information that can be put on the clipboard, text, images, html, custom formats, …..

General tips & tricks for all, Software we use, Windows tips & tricks

I’ve had this chart shown below for well over a dozen years. I’ve found it to be very useful for quickly adding a symbol to the document you are working on; particularly when working with emails describing things such as diameters and plus/minus dimension and angles. The trick is to simpy hold down the Alt key on your keyboard and while you are holding it down, you simply type the 4 numbers corresponding to the symbol you want and then release the Alt key. So you can quickly type 0.251Ø or 30°±1°

General tips & tricks for all, Windows tips & tricks