bluePrint Q&A
What is the difference between BluePrint's drawing types?
Short Answer
BluePrint supports 3 drawing types, Fabrication Drawings, Assembly Drawings and Custom Drawings. A BluePrint release package can contain any number of these drawing types and each drawing can contain multiple sheets. The Fabrication Drawing type is intended for documenting fabrication drawings. The Assembly Drawing type is intended for documenting assembly, sub-assembly, and mechanical assembly drawings. The Custom Drawing type is intended for documenting anything else you may want to document.
Long Answer
BluePrint supports 3 drawing types, Fabrication Drawings, Assembly Drawings and Custom Drawings. A BluePrint release package can contain any number of these drawing types and each drawing can contain multiple sheets.
The Fabrication Drawing type is intended for documenting fabrication drawings. The Assembly Drawing type is intended for documenting assembly, sub-assembly, and mechanical assembly drawings. The Custom Drawing type is intended for documenting anything else you may want to document.
The most significant difference between these drawing types is in the Assembly Drawing type. BluePrint Assembly Drawings can be set as Board Assembly or Generic Assembly types. The Board Assembly documents either the base assembly of a PCB board or one of multiple assembly variants for the PCB assembly. The Generic Assembly documents any mechanical assembly which can be a parent or the subassembly of the base PCB board. Assembly Drawings can be associated with Parts List and Variant information and that information can be used to automatically generate Parts List and Variant List documentation.
When you import Parts List and Variant data from the CAD design file, the imported CAD Parts List data is shared by all Assembly drawings of Board Assembly type. You can then drag and drop a Parts List or Variant List onto the Assembly Drawing sheet and it will automatically generate from BluePrint’s database. If you then import a new CAD design file, all drawings and drawing elements of Board Assembly type are updated. You can view the imported Parts List data in the Imported Data table of the Parts List Manager. The imported Parts List data cannot be modified.
However, you can also import Parts List and Variant data from a CSV (comma separated value) file. This imported data can be used to augment or replace the Parts List data imported with the CAD design file on a specific Assembly sheet. In this way, you can document multiple Assembly’s and Variants with their associated Parts Lists.
The Generic Assembly document allows you to document Parts Lists data imported from a CSV file, but not Parts List data imported from the CAD design file. With Generic Assemblies you can also build a Parts List by entering user data in the Parts List manager. This allows the creation of Unit or parent assemblies, where the board assembly may be a single part number item.
Fabrication Drawings and Custom Drawings do not have the above association with Parts List data. For this reason, Parts List and Variant List drawing elements are not available when a Fabrication Drawing or Custom Drawing is active (selected.)