Woodwork for Inventor Overview

It is an add-on for the Autodesk Inventor mechanical design software which turns this software into a work environment for computer-aided design of furniture and other wooden products.

This furniture design software package enables constructors to work more efficiently and accurately, with fewer errors, allowing them more time for creative work by automating routine tasks of digital information preparation required to start the manufacturing process.

Important! Each commercial licenses with subscription gets an additional license for home usage.

Woodwork for Inventor is recommended for you if:

  • You design complex furniture.
  • Your designs are bespoke, or are customised from existing designs to suite your customer.
  • Your design time takes up most of your production lead time.
  • You require cutting tickets to include laminates, veneers and edge banding (Including trimming allowances and grain direction).
  • You require a parts list for procurement.
  • You require the generation of multiple CNC cut files for production.
  • You need the flexibility to make late changes to your design, without causing huge amounts of re-work in the preparation of your design for manufacture.

 

Woodwork for Inventor Features

SKELETON DRESS UP 
Section, board, assembly, etc.		 MATERIAL ASSIGNMENT
Fillings, coatings, multi-layer boards,  composite parts, etc. 		 Multiplication Arrangement of Furniture Hardware
Components, axes defining the hardware position, component database, etc.
Automatic Generation of Mortises and Tenons
Components, holes, joints, etc.		 Automatically Generate of Edge Body
Assigned edge banding material.		 Size Calculation of Part & Blank
Texture direction, overlaps, added coating, sunk coating, etc.
Export to Cutting Optimisation Program
List of cutting parts, cutrite, etc.		 Bill of Materials Generator 
Product structure, list of cutting parts, erp, etc.		 Automatic Generation of Drawing
Drawings, templates, annotations, projections, scaling, etc.
Use of Prototype & Assembly Copying
Renaming of files, connections between components, hierarchical encoding, etc.		 CNC Preparation  
CNC machine tool, drilling, milling, mortising, cutting, etc.		 Data Integration with the Autodesk Vault Program
Dimensions, materials, data, specification, etc.

System Requirements

For designing up to 1000 parts

  • Microsoft Windows OS: Windows 7,  Windows 8.1 or Windows 10
  • Autodesk Inventor: Autodesk Inventor or Autodesk Inventor Pro (2017, 2018, 2019)
  • Processor: 64-bit Intel or AMD, 2 GHz or faster
  • RAM: 8 GB RAM
  • Video card: Microsoft Direct3D 10® capable graphics card or higher

For designing more than 1000 parts

  • Microsoft Windows OS: Windows 7,  Windows 8.1 or Windows 10
  • Autodesk Inventor: Autodesk Inventor or Autodesk Inventor Pro (2017, 2018, 2019)
  • Processor: Intel® Xeon® E3 or Core i7 or equivalent, 3.0 GHz or greater
  • RAM: 20 GB RAM
  • Video card: Microsoft Direct3D 11® or capable graphics card or higher

Other Requirements

  • 15 GB free disk space for installation
  • 1280 x 1024 or higher screen resolution
  • Microsoft Excel 2003, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016
  • Internet connection
support
whats included

Woodwork for Inventor Features

Skeleton Dress Up

Section, board, assembly, etc.

This function suite allows to speed up a skeleton design process significantly. Now user can dress up created furniture volume with panels, make a parallel panel and to trim these panels.

Dressing up the skeleton body with boards

Board trimming

Material Assignment

Fillings, coatings, multi-layer boards, composite parts, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor adds an extra feature to the Autodesk Inventor software which allows the user to easily and visually assign furniture materials (Solid wood, Board, Laminated board, Multilayer board, Rod, Desktop, Veneer/film, Edge banding, Paint) to parts using the data base which can be freely added to by the user.

Solid wood

Board

Laminated board

Multilayer board

Rod

Desktop

Laminated board with edge banding

Composite board

Veneer/film, Edge banding, Paint

Multiplication Arrangement of Furniture Hardware

Components, axes defining the hardware position, component database, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor uses its own method of components arrangement which utilises the design connections (iMate) pre-existing in the assembly elements. The designer simply needs to specify which load-bearing geometric elements a specified component needs to be attached to and it will automatically be multiplied in all possible position combinations based on the specified load-bearing geometric element. As compared to standard Autodesk Inventor mechanisms, this ensures a much faster arrangement of fittings in a piece of furniture.

Axes defining the hardware position in the furniture model

Example of the parts’ assembly

Automatic Generation of Mortises & Tenons

Components, holes, joints, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor uses its own mortise cutting method which, unlike conventional systems, primarily allows you to quickly arrange hardware fittings in a model and to automatically cut required holes accordingly.

Minifix and Dowel connection creation

Hinge connection creation

Japanese joint

X form board joining

Automatically Generate of Edge Body

Automatically generate edge bodies

Woodwork for Inventor allows you to automatically generate edge bodies based on the assigned edge banding material with a single click of a button and to recalculate the dimensions of the part model accordingly.

Automatically generate edge body

Size Calculations of Part & Blank

Texture direction, overlaps, added coating, sunk coating, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor expands the range of Autodesk Inventor design capabilities by adding a feature which can really come in handy for furniture makers. The designer, using the materials assignment command of Woodwork for Inventor, can easily assign the main material to an Autodesk Inventor part from which the part will be cut, and place coatings for the surfaces of the part which are necessary to realize the furniture construction.

Blank sizing based on the change in the texture direction

Change in the blank size due to the addition of overlap

Size calculation based on “on top” and “sunk” position

CNC Preparation

CNC machine tool, drilling, milling, mortising, cutting, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor has an optional CAM feature which, based on the geometry of furniture parts, enables easy preparation of programs for CNC machine tools. To achieve this, you simply need to specify the datum point of the part and use a required operation: drilling, milling, mortising or cutting.

Currently, Woodwork for Inventor has post-processors for the following systems:

  • BiesseWorks (.cix)
  • AlphaCAM (.dxf)
  • CNI Informatica (.cni)
  • AutoCAD (.dxf)
  • TpaCAD (.tcn)
  • EdiCAD (.tcn)
  • IMAwop (.fmc)
  • MasterWood (.tlf)
  • WoodWOP (.mpr)
  • TwinCAM (.dxf)
  • Hops (.hop)

Setting the base point

Automated hole generation for drilling operation

Sidebar of the created CNC technology and representation of tool trajectory on the screen

Created CNC technology transferred to Woodwop software

Assembly View representation of the CNC technology preparation status

Export to Cutting Optimasation Program

List of cutting parts, cutrite, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor has a very flexible mechanism for combining specifications. To achieve this, you simply have to change the template in MS Excel format and in this way you can generate a report of a desired form. This principle allows easy generation of reports of a desired form and preparation of reports it so that they are supported by other programs.

Export to cutting optimisation program

Bill of Materials Generator

Product structure, list of cutting parts, erp, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor uses its own specification generator which allows for automatic generation of information required for furniture production based on the designed 3D furniture model.

Specification generator

Automatic Generation of Drawings

Drawings, templates, annotations, projections, scaling, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor allows for automated generation of product drawing bundles by a single command. The user can open any of their designed products and generate a chosen drawing bundle. These may include production drawings or documents for printing labels, etc. There is capability to export Drawings into new additional formats – PDF, DWG, DXF and DWF.

Example of generated documents

Use of Prototype & Assembly Copying

Renaming of files, connections between components, hierarchical encoding, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor allows you to make an independent copy of any existing furniture model thus the designer is able to quickly design similar furniture of the same concept having different configurations and dimensions.

Use of prototype and assembly copying

Data Integration with the Autodesk Vault Program

Dimensions, materials, data, specification, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor provides an option of integrating generated information with the Autodesk Vault Professional product data management system. Proper configuration of the Woodwork for Inventor and Autodesk Vault Professional software allows you to automatically transfer such component parameters as part or workpiece dimensions, material or color codes which have been assigned while working with the Woodwork for Inventor program, etc.

Woodwork for Inventor information in the Autodesk Vault Professional specification

CNC program included in the specification item container

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Need more information about Woodwork for Inventor? Call us at +64 9 302 4028.

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