Patterned mate connectors do not appear in assemblies?

VanJr

I have a wire rope sheave in a parts studio. Then I created a mate connector on the wire rope tread (in parts studio). Then I created a circular pattern of the mate feature (in parts studio) ensuring I selected "Feature" as the pattern type. I then add my part into an assembly. The wire rope tread mate connector source is present but the circular pattern mate connectors are not present. What am I doing wrong?

https://cad.onshape.com/documents/d123fbd950d2480bf4cf6d36/w/57429db4f0647d5dc554db7f/e/263d70b084cfa4420e3d9297

john_mcclary

May be a bug,

On a side note, You shouldn't need additional mate connectors for that anyway.

Just select fastened, then select the concentric center of the pulley, and select the radius of the rope's corner.
https://cad.onshape.com/documents/28050bca2b1ddeb0acbab720/w/72369ffa7faabbf84de28ab1/e/ba59ef909663083b69ce1c5e

VanJr

How do I line up the sheave tread with the center of the slotted hole? I've tried a few mate combinations and it doesn't seem to work. Or, I'm doing it wrong. But, if my mates appeared then I could properly mate this assembly based on the size of the sheave (should I ever change it).




This is the goal (following two pics):

john_mcclary

Depends on your design intent,
but If it were me, I would use the rope as the master.

That being said, just use a slider mate to the center of the hole, and the center of the rope profile

By doing it this way, you gain the ability to set any angle, not restricted to just quadrants of the pulley

VanJr

Unfortunately, the wire rope is added at the end of design, not at the beginning.

john_mcclary

Just food for thought.

Typically in my environment I am positioning pulleys relative to the rope, usually a safety pull cord around the perimeter of the machine. In these cases it's easier to define the rope first.

But for a conveyor belt I would start with the pulleys in a nominal location and define the belt path wherever the pulleys stretch it.

So it's all about your design intent. Sounds like you want the conveyor belt method, in which case. There should be a frame defining the pulley locations, so it would just be an offset off the pulley center equal to the radius.

VanJr

We design using the sheaves first, starting from the target element to be lifted/lowered and work backwards. Sheaves get positioned first, floating in space relative to the target element. Once we have all the sheaves and draw-works (again, sheaves only) in relatively final position then we start adding structure around the sheaves. 

This is why we like using the quadrant mates to ensure that the tread (wire rope or chain) is properly aligned. Occasionally we have fleeting but we try to keep that to a minimum.

john_mcclary

I see.
Well, all that's left is submitting the bug report for Mate Connector Patterns.
If you open your document and send the ticked through there, they will contact you fairly quickly.

Jake_Rosenfeld

@VanJr

If you check the "Apply per instance" checkbox in the feature pattern, the mate connectors will show up in your assembly.

VanJr

I did submit a bug report. It's not a bug, it's user error.
Turns out that you have to make sure you check Apply per instance in the pattern dialog box:

john_mcclary

Good to know, It's sometimes unclear when to use that check.
Tend to forget about it.