Spreadsheet and Configurations

[Kirch]

Spreadsheet and Configurations

Am setting up a spreadsheet/Configuration system for some stock kitchen cabinet boxes- Have been working with a cnc owner this year getting some drawings to him.

Have a Kitchen to build and would like to set up a template for the upper and lower boxes-

I can see how the spreadsheet driven design works as well as configurations-

This is what is making sense to me at the moment-

I'll use the lower cabinet side as my starting point example-

On the spreadsheet I can enter in all of my driving dimensions for a particular cabinet side.(depth,height,material thickness,toekick etc) I set this up in an intuitive manner so that the embedded calcs for things like (counter height-counter thickness-.25 =overall case side height) will be out of the way when I change the main parameters-

If I want to make a different configuration, say to add 5mm shelf holes, but want to keep the overal panel dimensions, I am copying the spreadsheet and renaming this spreadsheet and then going through the set up process again with excel-
First time around it seems to take a bit of time but for future iterations of this basic box I believe it will speed up the Design to shop process. Keeping dados and material thickness correct with the appropriate setbacks from the edge seems to be as likely to change as the overall height,depth etc.

If anyone has any experience with this let me know-

regards,

karl

 

[Kirch]

Config

Best I can figure-
The cabinet sides are linked to the spreadsheet-Dados/ToeKick/Panel Height/Material Thickness/Nailer Thickness etc. Alot faster than going into the model and changing allthese parameters

Then a helper box is created in an assembly to which are constrained the cabinet sides.

Then the top/back/and bottom are created in the assembly view and designed to fit between the two sides.

Configurations only deal with the width of the cabinet-

I saw this somewhere in this forum before but don't quite remember where.

nevertheless,

ANy refined methods of achieving this would be appreciated- My set up is a little messy at the moment-Will get it working and clean it up as I go-



thx,

karl

 

[alexfranke]

You need to talk to WoodWorks on this forum -- I think he's thought all of this through, and he's probably already implemented a lot of what you're describing, as well as defined some excellent best practices.

See, for example, the drawer bank he posted and discussed on this thread: (scroll down for the latest version)
http://www.alibre.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2429

-Alex