I'd like to know what is the best practice for modeling machined castings.

We typically model the end item machining during design, then go back in and add a configuration for the casting once the design is fairly solid. To do that, machined features are moved to the bottom of the tree, and casting stock is added where appropriate. Features and then Suppressed and/or Resolved as required.

This is problematic/inefficient at best, and in one case presented serious issues a couple of years down the road when others worked on the model.

I'd like to use the Base Part approach, where you would insert the end-item designed model (machining) as the 1st feature in a separate casting model? The only difficulty I can see is where you need to add stock through a machined fillet or other feature where adding stock isn't exactly straight forward. Seems manageable though, with diligence.

Is this a common practice that we just haven't used here yet?

Would appreciate any feedback.