Manufacturer/Distributor parts/cost catalogs for Bill of Materials

[Michael]

Is it possible to import parts catalogs from manufacturers or distributors
into Visio to specify actual part numbers and prices in order to derive a
more comprehensive bill of materials? This particular question is related to
the mechanical engineering discipline.

From my rather dated experience with CAD, various manufacturers and
distributors provided add-ins that permitted the creation of a more detailed
Bill of Materials for estimating and bidding purposes.

Thank you for any guidance you might offer.

 

[AlEdlund]

There are examples in the msdn library of doing parts lookups/pricing for
bom type applications. The examples usually use MS Access. The ability to
import the manufacturer catalog data into whatever data source you want to
work with, of course, is between you and the manufacturer.
al

 

[Michael]

Al, thank you very much for the guidance and for your rapid reply. I will
check on MSDN.

 

[AlEdlund]

you might check this one out..
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa140253(office.10).aspx
al

 

[philippe c]

This is not what you asked for :
A site with parts from many well known and less know parts manufacturors.
Free and not free.
http://www.traceparts.com

There are some drawing with output in 2D DXF format, but there is no
advanced search.

 

[AlEdlund]

You're correct in that the site does not have part information, it does
however have a demonstration on using visio to look up part data and prepare
a bom (in excel).
al