Assembly ID

Each drawing has an assembly ID. This ID specifies the assembly structure for different automatic procedures like connections and joints in steel engineering and for adding front plates to beams etc.!

The assembly parameter in ALG3DPAR.DAT
The assembly ID of the drawing

The assembly ID parameter in ALG3DPAR.DAT

When installing HiCAD, you can choose, as of version 1212.2, whether you want to use the old main part/sub-part structure or the new assembly structure. Depending on the settings you choose here, the following entry in ALG3DPAR.DAT (HiCAD SYS directory) is changed accordingly:

Generate main parts and sub-parts automatically in assembly structure (0: no; 1: yes with general groups, 2: yes with bolted and welded groups).

The default value is 1.

0	You continue to work with the old main part and sub-part structure. The assembly functions are not available to you! This also applies to connections, links etc. in steel engineering. Here, too, the old structure is used. This procedure is not recommended, as the assembly functions provide significant advantages, especially for cross-industry drawings.
1	The new assembly functions are available to you. The automatic procedures in steel engineering do not, however, automatically distinguish between bolted and welded assemblies.
2	As for 1, but with automatic differentiation of welded and bolted assemblies.

This setting in ALG3PAR.DAT defines the assembly ID of a new drawing when it is created!

The assembly ID of the drawing

When a new drawing is created, the assembly ID is defined by the corresponding parameter in ALG3DPAR.DAT.

Note that you cannot make subsequent changes to the ID.

If, therefore, you have chosen the old main part/sub-part structure in ALG3DPAR.DAT, a new drawing will be assigned this ID when it is created. This means that this structure is also used for the above-mentioned automatic procedures! Even if subsequent changes are made to ALG3DPAR.DAT, the ID of the drawing remains unaltered. Although you can use the assembly functions manually, the automatic procedures do not take them into account.

If you are using existing drawings of an earlier HiCAD version (before version 1212), the procedure is as follows:

If the structure can be determined uniquely, the drawing is automatically assigned the ID. For drawings before HiCADneXt version 1211, this is the main part/sub-part structure.
If the part structure cannot be determined uniquely, HiCAD, when loading the drawing, asks you to specify the structure to be used in future and hence the assembly ID of the drawing:
Sub-parts directly under main parts (old structure)
Main parts and sub-parts under general assemblies
Main parts and sub-parts under assembly and welding assemblies