A stock material represents a category of raw material used during manufacturing. A stock material organizes tooling information. It differs from a physical material, which describes the material properties of a model. When you assign a stock material to a Setup, Fusion groups the associated tool presets to simplify tool selection.
A stock material can be associated with one or more physical materials. This allows different physical materials to share the same tooling recommendations. Think of a stock material as a group of materials that require the same presets for manufacturing.
For example, a Stainless Steel stock material can be associated with several stainless steel grades. All those grades then share the same tool presets without needing separate stock material definitions.
Similarly, you can create a tool preset for the Low-Carbon Steel stock material and apply it to physical materials such as Steel, Steel AISI 1006 85 HR, Steel ASTM A36, and Steel AISI 1015. This way, you apply presets across a range of materials without creating a preset for each one.
Keywords help identify stock materials during searching and matching. You can use keywords to include:
For example, a stock material named Aluminum Alloys might include keywords such as 6061, 7075, ISO N1, and Aluminium.
Stock materials can include hardness information. Hardness values help distinguish similar materials. You can also use them to filter materials in the Stock Material Library.
For the list of hardness measurement systems, see Supported hardness units.