Embedding Designs in Autodesk Fusion 360 - My Practical Case

Wrapping up an aircraft maintenance class is a bittersweet experience for me.

On one hand, I miss sitting in a hangar full of airplanes, doing homework, while chatting with my classmates about.... airplanes.

What gearhead wouldn't want a classroom like this? 

On the other hand.... I suddenly have my weeknights back to relax! 

So how did I spend one of my first evenings free?  I took a fundamental lesson I learned in class, and integrated it into Autodesk Fusion 360.  

What was the lesson?  

It starts with something my aircraft maintenance teachers, both my formal instructors and my colleagues with far more experience have continually reinforced. 

"Know your references to your information!  Book, chapter, page, and paragraph!"  Sometimes they would add, "And because your buddy said so does not count!"

That meant looking through a lot of books, real paper books.  If I was lucky, I had a PDF that I could scan through.  But even that took time.

Manuals in Aircraft Maintenance are big, heavy, and required! 

I quickly learned to write down key class info in a small composition book, naturally, I included the relevant book, chapter, page, and paragraph.

My little composition notebook.

But next came rivet spacing.  It's the standard spacing found in the FAA Advisory Circular AC43.13. 

The image from AC43.13. 

Sure, I can write it down in my composition, and naturally, I did!   But I also decided that I would build it in Fusion 360, just for a little practice.

The completed rivet pattern in Fusion 360

But as I finished up my little practice exercise,  My teachers words echoed in my mind.

How can I make the most use of this.  How can I make the information available.

Why?  It's available to anyone with the link, and it's a good visual representation of the finished product.  (Note that AC43,13 is referenced in the title block)






It's a link in the chain of information.  Just like I was taught, it's part of knowing where to find the information.

And it's not about knowing the information, it's about knowing where to find it!

So here's another example of embedded information in Fusion 360.  If you'd like to see the full steps, I wrote a post on that subject here.

Take a look!  And see if it can help you! .