FEDEVEL
Platform forum

Tom Yunghans , 11-28-2023, 10:47 PM

I was thinking that Altium' Multi-board assembly file (MbaDoc) might be a good way to verify that my Altium design PCB fits in the chassis properly. The Multi-board capability has some fairly new features to assist in placing the PCB in the chassis (mating) and also a "section view" which can be very useful in looking for collisions and clearance problems. However, currently, the MbaDoc capability does not seem to be able to support hiding the various pieces of the step model that you import. So, for example, I have a 3D step file for the chassis which has separate pieces (e.g. lid, body), but I can't hide the lid or body in the MbaDoc, which makes it pretty difficult to define the mates and get the PCB mounted properly inside the box.

The capability to hide the various pieces of the step model exists in the normal PCB worksheet. Does anyone know if Altium plans on incorporating this into the MbaDoc?

Does anyone know of an easy way to take this step file, disable the lid, then export a new step model which I could then import into the MbaDoc? Do I need to use a tool like "Fusion 360" to do that? Any suggestions?

qdrives , 11-29-2023, 02:43 PM

As for the last part - FreeCad may be able to do this too (and is actually free).
It depends on whether the bodies are distinct or not.

As for the first part - I think that Altium expect people to do this mating / checking in the 3D tool (ie. Solidworks).