Catia V5 Preferences

In the Menu Bar, click Edit > Preferences, then on the left side of the dialog box, select Import > Catia V5.

Import Options

Surfaces

Sets the type of surface data imported into the scene. Select from Import none, Import visible, and Import all.

Meshes

Imports the type of mesh data imported into the scene. Select from Import none, Import visible, and Import all.

Curves and Polygon Lines

Imports the type of curve and polygon line data imported into the scene. Select from Import none, Import visible, and Import all.

Tessellation

Tessellation Quality

Sets the maximum triangle aberration for tessellation from the b-splines. Select from Coarse, Low, Medium, High, and Custom.

Chord Deviation

Sets the maximum deviation between the NURBS surface and the tessellated surface.

Normal Tolerance

Displays the normal tolerance of adjacent triangles in degrees.

Max Chord Length

Defines the maximum edge length of the generated polygons.

Enable Stitching

Enables stitching of adjacent edges.

Stitching Tolerance

Sets the tolerance where two adjacent edges are considered to be touching and where they should be stitched together.

Advanced Options

Keep Surface Data

Keeps NURBS data after tessellation, rather than deleting it.

Unify Surface Normals

Ensures all surface normals point in the same direction.

Merge Geometries

Merges the geometries to create one single (stitched) mesh, since a single shell can have many NURBS surfaces.

Create Groups for Layers

Items that are originally organized in layers (for example, in Autodesk Alias) are organized into groups. Otherwise, the objects are all placed under the same parent node.

Remove Empty Groups

Remove empty (unnecessary) groups.

Unshare Nodes

Shared node instances, used to save system memory, are removed so that nodes exist independently.

Flush Transformation

Stores the transformation data within objects themselves rather than in higher-level group nodes. In other words, if you have a hierarchy of transformation parent nodes of a geometry node, all of them are baked into one single matrix within the geometry; the original information is lost. You would want to avoid this, for example, for animating wheels on a moving car.

File Specific

Import Group Materials

Doesn't create additional MaterialGroup nodes for part files, assemblies, or instances, and simple discards the materials, when disabled. For some Inventor workflows, you may want this enabled to create these MaterialGroup nodes.

Import Associative Meshes

Imports data associated with your meshes, rather than excluding it.

Import Invisible Instances

Imports invisible (hidden) instance data, rather than excluding it.

Import Referenced Files

Toggles the import of all part files and sub-assemblies referenced by the assembly file on or off.

Import Coordinate Systems

Toggles the import of the Axis Systems from CATIA into VRED. Since CATIA files can have multiple coordinate systems, VRED see these, import them, and create transformation groups with a coordinate cross for a better representation in the viewport.

Note:

There is also an import option that appears when importing a CATIA file into VRED.

Importer

Choose one of the following methods as the default used for importing Catia V5 files. There should be no differences in tessellation quality, structure, material import, or naming conventions between these methods.

  • Lightweight - The faster default method for importing V5 files, which skips several operations in ATF that are not required to translate CAD data to VRED.

  • Legacy - The old method for importing V5 files, which is a fallback if issues arise using the Lightweight method.