ASCON Licenses 3D_Kernel_IO To Enhance KOMPAS-3D

A few days ago Russian MCAD software vendor, ASCON issued a press release announcing that KOMPAS-3D, the company’s flagship MCAD system, can now read proprietary files from CATIA, NX, SolidWorks, Pro/ENGINEER (yeah, that name is going to stick for a while) and Inventor. This is due to them licensing a data exchange component called 3D_Kernel_IO from Core Technologie (yeah, there are two underscores in that brand name).

Different CAD systems use different tolerances and mathematics to define geometry. When converting 3D CAD data from one format to another this sometimes results in untrimmed surfaces, missing faces, gaps, overlaps and other topological problems. 3D_Kernel_IO attempts to solve this by adapting the geometry to the tolerance and mathematics of the target system and sewing loose faces properly to yield water tight solid objects.

According to Core Technologie:

3D_Kernel_IO native interfaces read feature Information and PMI of threads, holes, chamfers, filets, patterns, drafts, pockets, extrusions and other feature types as well as assembly features. The data structure represents all feature types used by today’s CAD systems. 3D_Kernel_IO maps the construction history and parameters directly from the binary file without requiring access to a license of the source CAD system.

I’m very interested to see how this works with real world data. If you have some interesting CATIA, NX, SolidWorks, Creo or Inventor files you can share, please send them to me at deelip (at) deelip (dot) com. I’ll try and get a hold of a sample application from Core Technologie or the new version of KOMPAS-3D, run some tests and report the results here.