Pro/ENGINEER Tips & Tricks:
Modeling a large pattern with surface copies.

When you need to model a part with a large pattern of (grouped or complex) features you might consider getting off the beaten track and instead of  using standard Pro/E features and patterns,  use surface copies.

The idea is that you:
  1. create the first feature or group of features like you are used to in Pro/E
  2. then copy all surfaces associated to those features using the Seed and Boundary method
  3. pattern the copied surfaces
  4. finally solidify the patterned copied surfaces.
This yields a much more stable, faster and smaller part alltogether.

Here an example from the real world and a detailed description on how to create such a part with Wildfire 2.0.
(download the base part here if you want to try it yourself)



We needed to create this part with an 8x11 pattern of a group of features.
Initially it was created using standard features and patterns.
But this part turned out to be very slow in regeneration and save times and even buggy with some builds of Pro/E.
After we recreated the pattern with surface copies the performance was much better.
Part Size RegenTime SaveTime
Old style part 84 Mb 47 secs 13 secs
Features created with surface copies 2.2 Mb 9 secs 1 sec


Here's how you can do this:

Step 1: The first group of features consists of the following features:
So that's step 1.

Step 2: The surfaces of these feature's are copied using the Seed and Boundary method.

In this front hiddenline view you see that some features only extrude from the bottom surface up:


This makes it necessary to copy the surfaces in two phases:
  1. First I'll copy the surfaces of the two extruded cut's at the bottom:

    Set the Selection Filter to Geometry:


    Then select the bottom surfaces of the two extrudes:


    And while holding the Shift-key select the bottom surface of the model:


    When the Shift-key is released all surfaces of this feature are selected:


    Now do Edit -> Copy and Edit ->Paste. Pro/E now opens the dashboard with a Surface copy and the Seed and Boundary surfaces as reference:


    Just press the OK button:


    The surfaces are now copied:

  2. Now I'll copy the surfaces associated to the other features:

    Select the flat recessed surface as the seed surface:


    Select the top and the bottom surfaces as the boundaries, by holding the Shift-key and select the top surfaces and holding the SHift- and Ctrl-key when selecting  the bottom surface (takes a bit of practice to do so ...):


    Again do Edit -> Copy and Edit ->Paste.  In the dashboard open the References Flyout and select Details.
    You must see the bottom and  top surface as Boundary references:

    Now finsih the copy.

The two Surface copies are now created:



Step 3: The surfaces will now be patterned. as a directional pattern.

In order to pattern both copied surfaces at once they need to be grouped first.
In the Model Tree select both Copies and do RMB -> Group:


Now Pattern this group as a directional pattern in two directions using datums FRONT and RIGHT:




Now finish the pattern:


NOTE: The first copied surface of this pattern lies exactly over the exisitng geometry.  When these surfaces are solidified in the next step Pro/E might encounter problems  with the first feature  (which is currently [WF2-M190] the case with Sheetmetal parts, because it tries to create solid geometry over existing geometry. To prevent this you need to transform-copy the copied surface to one of the opposite corners and pattern it backwards so you can disable the pattern-member which lies over the original geometry. This can be done by selecting the copied surfaces and then do Ctrl-C -> Edit -> Paste Special .


Step 4: The paaterned surfaces now need to be solidified.

The Solidify feature uses surfaces to create solid geomtery (in this case a cut).
You first need to solidify the first Copy surfaces and then pattern the solidify feature.
This has to be done twice since we had two original Copy surfaces and you can only solidify one surface at a time.

In the Model tree expand the Pattern, and the Group and select the first Copy surface and do Edit -> Solidify:


The first Surface Copy will be Solidified:

Just finish the dashboard.

Now do the same for the second Copy surface:



At the bottom of the Model Tree, two Solidify features are created.
Pattern them both:



And that's it.