Imported Geometry errors and performance

[oldguynewbike]

If you leave import diagnostic errors (faulty faces and gaps) unrepaired is there a negative performance impact? Specifically with regards to vendor supplied PCBs. Our engineering department has a requirement of repairing ALL import diagnostic errors on imported geometry. I do understand that if you are going to manipulate (add features) to imported geometry that it IS important to repair them so it won't cause any issues. I have tried to explain that it isn't the fact there are import errors that slows these down when used in larger assemblies, it is the sheer number of faces that it has that causes the performance issues. Some of the more complex PCBs can take weeks to repair all of the import errors on, and I just don't see the purpose if your are not manipulating the imported part unless some feature that you need is directly impacted by a face not being there or something like that. Can anyone confirm that I am correct? I have done smaller repairs and compared the load times to an unrepaired import and I see no performance gain whatsoever.

[Ömür Tokman]

performance is about geometric difficulties, not errors. An error does not mean that it will reduce performance.
If it's not a challenge for you, don't waste your time with open surfaces, I think.
Challenge: Rendering, assembly, customer request etc...

[DanPihlaja]

There are times where Solidworks will not function properly with errors like that.

Example:
I imported a model from our customer and it had 2 general faults.

Before I fixed those faults, I was having trouble with all sorts of things. In this case I was having loads of trouble with mating properly in an assembly.

But, I have seen other issues in the past with this kind of thing as well.

It definitely takes longer to open.
Doing almost anything geometrically with it will have a harder time and may error out more often.
Mating errors.....all sorts of things.

If the only thing that you are doing is dropping it into an assembly and fixing it in place, then you might be able to get away with it.....but expect problems.

What I tend to do is fix the problems by replacing surfaces, and then save it out as a parasolid and re-open it.



Another thing to try is to open the STEP file with 3D interconnect ON, and then dissolve the feature that is created. This is because (with SW 2018 anyway), the translator for 3D interconnect is more robust than the translator that is used without it (don't ask me why there are 2....I have no idea).
(this was confirmed from Solidworks employees way back when we had the old forum). They may have fixed this in later version of Solidworks though.

[zxys001]

If you leave import diagnostic errors (faulty faces and gaps) unrepaired is there a negative performance impact? Specifically with regards to vendor supplied PCBs. Our engineering department has a requirement of repairing ALL import diagnostic errors on imported geometry. I do understand that if you are going to manipulate (add features) to imported geometry that it IS important to repair them so it won't cause any issues. I have tried to explain that it isn't the fact there are import errors that slows these down when used in larger assemblies, it is the sheer number of faces that it has that causes the performance issues. Some of the more complex PCBs can take weeks to repair all of the import errors on, and I just don't see the purpose if your are not manipulating the imported part unless some feature that you need is directly impacted by a face not being there or something like that. Can anyone confirm that I am correct? I have done smaller repairs and compared the load times to an unrepaired import and I see no performance gain whatsoever.

Hello oldguynewbike,

Not a easy answer,... You "may" experience issues downstream though or in a assembly. Geometry errors can really cause havoc if you do not mend/tend to them. As long as everyone on the team is aware of or flags the data as a potential issue, you can have a higher degree of confidence that data is not a huge issue. I'd only use the geometry you need from the import.. key surfaces, edges, holes,.. coordinates and delete every thing else.
Now, for PCB's.. I would not be overly concerned if you're "only" using them as a reference and not as a driving geometry link in your design. That is, break any parent/child links, "For reference only".
Over the years, one area which is not always easy to resolve with breps which share edges or create a inverted volume or slivers which extend beyond the general volume (or to infinitely and beyond).
Anyhow, if you have to have a clean pcba... and you will need to use the geometry.. run all the analysis tools Fix or delete them (capacitor, resistor..) ASAP!
A few other notes... if you can ask for or experiment with different export types or file formats,.. sometimes that is all it takes to get a clean import.
And my last workaround is what I call, "Rinse, Wash and Repeat" That is, save/export the import as a IGES or STEP, and reimport until the auto repair fixes the problems. It may fix the errors after the first or second rinse/wash... If not, repair manually if needed.

[Jim Steinmeyer]

Question about repairing the import. When I run the repair diagnostic and it is not able to heal a surface or gap I can delete the offending surface or gap but I am unable to find a way to fill the resulting "hole" until after exiting the diagnostic. Is that correct? Or is there a way to repair the hole while still in there?

I am thinking that maybe de-featuring an imported item may be far more beneficial in saving time/making the model more responsive than going through it and repairing everything. Would that be correct?

[RichGergely]

You can fill the 'holes' in diagnostic, there are options. Whether it fixes or gives you what you want is another story. quite often the offending surface that creates the problem isn't necessarily highlighted and can't be fixed by the simple tools on offer within diagnostics.

Often you end up re-surfacing neighbouring surfaces to give correct edge geometry to be able to fix the 'hole' in question. This can't be done within diagnostics because if you delete the surface and try to fill there is more than one surface missing and solidworks can't work out exactly what it should look like.

[Alin]

If you have import geometry errors, you might encounter big performance hits when working with drawings, especially in SW 2020 and newer versions.

An excerpt from this article: https://www.engineersrule.com/fast-draw ... ssemblies/

Unfortunately, with improved functionality, more data needed to be written in the drawing file. If the drawing data was not optimized for this use, the saving operation took much longer than expected (hours versus seconds).

The way Detailing mode works is every edge is assigned a unique silhouette edgeID by SOLIDWORKS behind the scenes. High Quality Hidden Lines Removed (HLR) drawing views already have these edge IDs, so drawings save performance for HLR drawings is the same in 2020/2021 and older versions.

These unique silhouette edgeIDs are not present for Shaded or Shaded with Edges. As a result, upon save, these edgeIDs must be generated and assigned to all shaded with edges views across all sheets.

The result is the potential for a much slower save of an SLDDRW in 2020/2021 vs 2019 and older.


Figure 6.

In summary, if a drawing view could not be set as a high-quality view, the information related to model edges could not be efficiently written in the drawing file. That makes sense considering that in draft quality views the edges are computed based on the graphics-triangles extracted by tessellating the mathematical body data of the model. Imagine the sheer number of tiny triangles edges that must be stored for each single edge.

It is worth noting that if your drawings illustrate components with imported geometry errors, the drawing views will always be draft quality and the saving operation will suffer.

[zxys001]

Question about repairing the import. When I run the repair diagnostic and it is not able to heal a surface or gap I can delete the offending surface or gap but I am unable to find a way to fill the resulting "hole" until after exiting the diagnostic. Is that correct? Or is there a way to repair the hole while still in there?

I am thinking that maybe de-featuring an imported item may be far more beneficial in saving time/making the model more responsive than going through it and repairing everything. Would that be correct?

If you identify/delete the bad surface through the diagnostics that is fine and it may try to fix.. .but I don't believe you can manually? (or I just don't).. IO personally Iexit the diagnostics and delete/repair manually.

I guess you could run defeature and if it provides you with what you need,.. sure, why not?

[Alin]

Question about repairing the import. When I run the repair diagnostic and it is not able to heal a surface or gap I can delete the offending surface or gap but I am unable to find a way to fill the resulting "hole" until after exiting the diagnostic. Is that correct? Or is there a way to repair the hole while still in there?

Yes, you can delete faces and fill “holes”.

More information here: https://www.engineersrule.com/import-di ... ate-guide/

Note that there several benefits to using Import Diagnostics for deleting faces versus the Delete Face feature, mostly related to the file size and rebuild performance after the fact.

[Tom G]

Bump old topic.

Today I learned how to QUICKEN the Import Diagnostics process. Maybe. If you have similar circumstances. I don't know.

I have a very flawed STEP import from Emerson. Anyone familiar with importing STEPS from them for their Rosemount transmitters will know just how broken these usually are.

I was repairing only a portion of the import, intending to replace this portion shown with another. It turns out that the good portion I had elsewhere does not match this bad portion. Anyway, I backtracked to source STEP and re-tried.

This time, What you see pictured is only one Imported Surface. I suppressed all other Imported Surfaces, saved it as a Parasolid file, and reimported it so that this version only has that one Imported Surface.

For some reason, it is significantly different in the process of repairing, or actually mostly deleting faces through the Import Diagnostics tool. The first series of efforts were made upon a multibody imported part, where even with all other imported features suppressed, several were present and the Import Diagnostics, Delete Face command took about 4 to 10 minutes. Once I was processing ID upon a single-body import, the same method of Repair Face / Delete Face only takes 8 to 14 seconds. This is a huge improvement!

I had to resort to Import Diagnostics for deleting faces, mostly because I was unable to select the faces which I wanted to delete. After using ID, the single Surface-Imported1 is now replaced with about fifty Surface-Imported 's. I can now select these floating bodies to delete them as features, not with ID tools, nor with Delete Face features, but simply by deleting the new Surface-Imported itself.

This is only an example. Maybe if you have a troublesome import where a lot of errors are within one Surface-Imported, then try saving that out separately, reimporting only that, then running ID on a Part containing only that Surface Body.

[zxys001]

Bump old topic.
This is only an example. Maybe if you have a troublesome import where a lot of errors are within one Surface-Imported, then try saving that out separately, reimporting only that, then running ID on a Part containing only that Surface Body.

Hello Tom, from what I could find, their STEP files are generated from CREO so you're somewhat SOL because the blends will most likely fail.

They also have SAT files? The SAT is worse than the STEP. Personally, they should have just save it as a dumb CREO, X_T or an IGES file.

The other thing is to Enable the latest 3D Interconnect (it's better) to open the STEP and SaveAs a Parasolid.

Doing a search, it looks like a 3051? (rosemount transmitters step file 3051)

..some people have them on GrabCad and some others sites.
https://www.google.com/search?q=rosemou ... 97&bih=853