Sigmund ABA for Pro|Engineer can be used to resolve complex assembly problems for rigid bodies, evaluate design improvements, identify important design characteristics, and determine optimal tolerances for parts and assemblies created in Pro/ENGINEER. Using Sigmund from design concept through production will improve quality, reduce costs, and cut development cycle times.

Development of a Sigmund assembly build analysis model follows an intuitive, step-by-step methodology that includes the following stages:

• Component Geometry Creation: Model geometry can be exported from Pro/ENGINEER as a Pro/ENGINEER Part/Assembly data (wire frame or surface) or IGES, STEP data (wire frame or surface). The entities that can be exported to Sigmund are: CAD geometry (wire frame or surface), planes, lines, points, axis, and coordinate systems.
• GD&T or Tolerance Emulation: This step defines the component variation to be modeled. Pro/ENGINEER input tolerance information including the component GD&T datum structures and geometric tolerances must be reapplied to the relevant features using the functionality provided in Sigmund. Simple, menu-driven commands are used to define the datum reference frames, and tolerance feature control frames are simply filled as shown on the drawing. The capability also exists to emulate dimensional or tolerances if GD&T has not been used.
• Optimize: Using the output from the Sigmund model, the Pro/ENGINEER design can be evaluated, optimized and validated before a single part is manufactured. At this stage, different design concepts, locating schemes and assembly methods can be evaluated. Potential manufacturing processes and the resulting capabilities can be assessed. Tolerances can be tightened, if necessary, to meet the requirements or loosened if they are found to have little impact on the requirements.