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From time to time this question finds me via email: What about my MDT data and Vault? Mechanical Desktop (I’ll refer to it as MDT) had it’s last release with the 2009 series of products. As such, Vault does not have an add-in for this release. But, when you come across that hidden archive of MDT files, there is a way to get that into Vault, secure it, and prepare it for translating to Inventor.
The best, fastest, easiest way to get this data uploaded is to leverage Autoloader to bulk import the MDT data. Autoloader will examine parent/child relationships, as MDT assemblies uses Xref technology at its core.
If there is a file resolution issue, you can also use the Reference Manager included with AutoCAD (see te program group) to redirect external (referenced) files in MDT assemblies. Such is the case with legacy data sometimes.
Once inside Vault, you can examine all levels of the MDT assemblies and parts, showing the Uses/Where Used and keep all information intact. Any attributes or properties will also be indexed if configured so.
Finally, I highly suggest creating a Category called MDT Legacy for this data. One easy way to trigger this category is to set a rule that watches for the custom property in the MDT file called ‘AmdtFile Type’. If it is set to 83, then it’s MDT, if its set to 84, its AutoCAD Mechanical.
-Brian Schanen
