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Make Your First Build Manual
A quick walkthrough from an open assembly to an exported PDF. The pictures show the Servo Gripper manual, which was made exactly this way.
Your First Manual
You’ll need
BuildBook installed (see Install)
An assembly open in Fusion’s Design workspace
The loop
Add a step → add its parts → explode them → frame the shot → annotate.
Repeat until no parts are left, then export.
1. Open The Panel
Open your assembly and click BuildBook (UTILITIES → ADD-INS). The panel opens docked under the Browser.
Click Assembled (top right of the panel) whenever you want to edit the model itself: the step view only draws over it.
2. Add A Section And A Step
On the Steps tab click + Add section and name it (e.g. “Frame”), then + Add step under it and type the step’s name.
Sections group the steps in the manual (each gets its own page and parts list). Drag steps to reorder them, also between sections.
3. Add The Step’s Parts
Open the Step tab → Parts and click Pick, then click parts on the model. A click picks a whole assembly, a sub-assembly or a single part; hover a part and press H to hide it and reach behind.
Or use the Parts tab: it lists every part not in a step yet. Tick parts and click + Add to step.
4. Explode Them
In Explode moves click + Move. Choose a direction and drag the arrow (or type a distance).
Dashed trail lines are drawn from where each part sits to where it’s exploded. Add more moves to chain them: slide out, then drop.
5. Frame The Shot
Orbit and zoom until the step reads well, then open View & image and click Save view. Opening the step later goes straight back to this camera, and its picture is exported from it.
6. Annotate
Click Annotate to draw on the step’s picture: arrows, lines, boxes, ellipses, text and numbered callouts. Annotations go into the exported pictures and the PDF.
7. Rinse And Repeat
Add the next step and repeat until the Parts tab count reaches 0: every part of the assembly is then in a step.
Steps done more than once (e.g. one per corner) get a Repeat count instead of being drawn again: the manual says “Repeat this step 4 times” and the parts lists multiply.
8. Export
On the Export tab, choose the folder, then:
- Export all: one PNG per step, named “Section N – Step N – Step name.png”.
- Export PDF: the whole manual with parts lists.
What You Get
The PDF manual
A cover with a picture of the whole assembly and the contents
A page per section with its picture and parts list
Every step: number, name, notes, picture and parts
The full parts list, with hardware listed separately
The Servo Gripper Manual
Every page above came straight out of Export PDF. The same steps can also be exported as PNGs for a website (like the build guides on this site) or recorded as an assembly video.
First Manual Done!
See everything else BuildBook can do.