Drawing sketches in assemblies


As you develop the design concepts for a new assembly, it can be useful to draw sketches in an assembly document. You can draw a sketch on a principal plane of the base coordinate system, a planar face on a part in the assembly, or a reference plane.

Sketching in a synchronous assembly works in much the same manner as sketching in a synchronous part. This Help topic will focus on the areas where sketching in an assembly differs from sketching in a part.

Note:

For more information about sketching in synchronous parts, see Drawing synchronous sketches of parts.

Drawing an assembly sketch

You can use the commands on the Sketching tab in the Assembly environment to draw, dimension, and constrain sketch elements.

You can set style, color, type, and width options for the 2D elements to make it easier to interpret the assembly sketch.

You can add dimensions and relationships to control the position and size of the sketches. You can also define functional relationships using the Variables command.

You can use the PathFinder shortcut menu commands to control the display of the sketch elements, lock and unlock the sketch plane, and specify whether a sketch is considered permanent or impermanent.

Using an assembly sketch to construct parts

When you create or modify a part or subassembly in the context of the assembly, you can use your assembly sketches to construct part sketches.

You can use the Project to Sketch command to copy assembly sketch geometry into a part or subassembly document. The sketch geometry you copy is nonassociative.

Using a part to create assembly sketch elements

You can also use the following commands to construct an assembly sketch:

  • The Project to Sketch command also copies part edges into an assembly sketch. The sketch elements are not associative to the edge on the part. You cannot use the command to copy edges from one part into another part from the assembly.

  • The Peer Edge Locate command makes edges of other parts in locatable or non-locatable in a sketch window, and while in-place activated and working within the context of an assembly.

  • And the Silhouette Edge Locate command makes silhouette edges locatable or non-locatable in the profile or sketch window.

  • Other useful command include the Tear-Off Sketch command and the Copy Sketch command.

Positioning 3D components using assembly sketches

You can control the position of parts and subassemblies with respect to an assembly sketch. You can position 3D components using assembly relationships, such as connect, to connect a vertex on a part edge to a vertex on an assembly sketch element. Later, you can edit the size and position of the assembly sketch to move the part.

Assembly sketches and sketch regions

Sketch region functionality is not available in a synchronous assembly.

Assembly layouts Sketch command (Assembly environment)

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