Autodesk Inventor 7

Autodesk Inventor 7 is a part of Autodesk Inventor Series, which also includes AutoCAD 2004 and AutoCAD Mechanical workshop 2004. Some of the features of the software include: enhanced AutoCAD 2004 integration, DWF (Design Web Format) publishing, enhanced-large assembly design and shape manager. Let’s divide the enhancements in five major parts and then dig into them individually.

Drawing



The improvements in this paradigm include break-out views, perspective drawing views, support for expansion and updation of individual parts, and some enhancements in the whole table. Text alignment also gets a makeover with quick alignment of general notes, sketch text and parameter text. 

Part modeling



The Loft tool has been changed and a new Extrude dialogue box has been added besides the stitch, emboss and replace-face tools. Also, a comprehensive standard parts library, including 18 international standards and 12 different classes of standard parts, is added. It supports many features such as a list of favorite parts. Also, the part catalogue allows the user to change and replace a library part.

Sketching



There are new spline controls in sketching that help the user control overall spline tension and use spline handles as objects to which constraints and dimensions can be applied. 

Assembly design



One major enhancement in Inventor 7 is the introduction of a new workflow to manage large-assembly design. Improvements in the design view make working with subassemblies easier.

Interoperability



There are enhancements in the Mechanical Desktop and AutoCAD. In case of AutoCAD Inventor now translates each AutoCAD layer that contains data into individual Autodesk Inventor sketches. Besides this there are some new settings available in the DWG file import also. 

S N   A   P   S   H O   T Price : Standalone: Rs 2,74,725; Network (per network license): Rs 3,16,250 Key specs : More features to make it a part of the Inventor series Contact : Tech Pacific, Mumbai. Tel : 55960279/55960101,  E-mail : ravi.kumar@techpacindia.com

User Interface



The user interface support has customizations and the zoom feature using a scroll mouse besides other things.

One of the other enhancements is the inclusion of the DWF . This allows users to securely distribute their files as multiple 2D sheets and view them using the Autodesk Express Viewer. Though there are some interesting new upgrades to the software, they are more on the way of making it a part of the Autodesk Inventor Series. It makes a lot of sense to buy the software if you are buying it as a part of the Autodesk Inventor Series.

Geetaj Channana