Part II: Building Intelligence into Your Parts
- Click in a blank space to exit the design table. Double-click through the configura-
tions in the ConfigurationManager to see the results of your efforts.
FIGURE 10.36
Copying the equation to other cellsDrag this handleSummary
Configurations are a powerful way to control variations of a design within a single part file. Many
aspects of the part can be configured, while a few cannot. Manually created configurations are use-
ful for making a small number of variations and a small number of configurations, but they
become unwieldy when you need to make more than a few variations of either type.Design tables are recommended because they enable you to see all the changes more clearly that
have been made for all the configurations. Having the power of Excel available enables you to
access many functions that are not shown here, such as using lookup tables and Concatenate
functions to build descriptions or configuration names. I briefly revisit design tables in Chapter 14
on assembly configurations to expand on the information here and to incorporate the additional
assembly configuration information.