New Bend Note Controls for SolidWorks 2013

One enhancement SolidWorks offers in
2013 is more control over text and display of bend notes in drawings. This option is only available in the flat pattern view of a sheet metal part.

In the Drawing VIew Property Manager, you are now able to:

• Show or Hide Bend Notes


• Set the bend direction, bend radius, bend order, and bend allowance


• Remove the "R" for the bend radius


• Edit text


• Display complementary and supplementary bend angles

There are 6 Bend Notes options (in order left to right):

1. Bend direction


2. Supplementary angle


3. Complimentary angle


4. Bend Radius


5. Bend order


6. Bend allowance

Also available:

We can control the bend note precision per drawing view. Click OPTIONS (Standard toolbar) or go to Tools > Options. On the Document Properties tab, expand the Tables and click Bend to set the options (shown below).

Collinear bend notes can now be merged and unmerged.  To merge bend notes into a single note, select multiple notes, right-click and select Merge Bend Notes. To unmerge bend notes, right-click and select Unmerge Bend Notes.

Thanks!

Judy Marlo

CATI St. Louis

Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader - Part 5

Strategy 5: Focus on continuous quality improvement

Continuous quality improvement is the mantra of many
manufacturing organizations. It is also a primary focus of effective CAD
leaders. Your CAD system can have a significant impact on the quality of the
products that you design, the efficiency of your development processes, and the
ramifications of your work on downstream operations. How well your CAD tools
help you eliminate design errors, maximize productivity, and foster innovation
will determine the size of your group’s contribution to continuous quality
improvement.

Everyone involved in product development wants to eliminate
design errors, and with the right mix of CAD tools, you can pinpoint errors
during design and avoid the delays and costs that occur when errors make their
way into production. Are you using an integrated analysis/simulation
application to identify potential performance issues? Are you ensuring
sufficient clearances in your moving assemblies through the use of collision
detection capabilities? Are you conducting draft analyses on injection-molded
parts to ensure production of molds of consistent quality? Are you assessing
the manufacturability of your machined parts? If not, there are integrated tools
that can help you.

A focus on continuous quality improvement also applies to
your development processes. How do you complete tolerance stackups: manually or
using an automated CAD tool? What about prototyping? Do you conduct physical
tests or take advantage of virtual and rapid prototyping technologies? Do you
have an integrated PDM system that gives you tight revision control and allows
you to reuse designs that perform particularly well?

Sustainable design is an emerging area of focus for
achieving continuous quality improvement. As consumer awareness of
environmental impacts and preference for “greener” products continue to rise,
assessing the sustainability of your products and processes becomes
increasingly important. To get out in front of this trend, you can use CAD
tools that evaluate the sustainability of your designs.

Read past articles:

Strategy 1: Embrace best practices and new technologies

Strategy 2: Develop skills and retain talents

Strategy 3: Maximize integration and automation

Strategy 4: Foster collaboration and innovation

Strategy 5: Focus on continuous quality improvement

Strategy 6: Leverage design data throughout the enterprise

Strategy 7: Document and analyze productivity

Strategy 8: Manage product design data efficiently

Strategy 9: Communicate effectively with business personnel

Strategy 10: Demonstrate product development contributions

Download the Whitepaper - Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader

 

*This article is an excerpt from the "Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader White Paper", published by  DS SolidWorks Corp.

Congratulations to Peter Fischer

SolidWorks World 2013 is in the books.  For those of you that have never attended...start working on it for 2014.  For those of us in the Midwest, San Diego in January is as good a place to be as anywhere.

Please take a moment to join me in congratulating Peter Fischer of FBG Consulting.  Peter is a long-time CATI customer and the leader of the Central Indiana SolidWorks User Group (CISUG).  Peter was honored this year by receiving the User Group Leader of the Year Award, given in honor of Wayne Tiffany, who passed away in 2012.

In the postgame press conference...OK, there is no postgame press conference.  I shot Peter an email and asked for a comment.  Here is what he says:

"Being nominated as the SolidWorks User Group leader of
the year is indeed great honor, but this could not have been achieved without
the undying support from the CISUG 
members. CATI in particular has a been a very strong supporter of the
CISUG in providing its excellence in technical presentations and networking
opportunities.

"I would also like to add a comment as an independent
engineering consultant who depends on SolidWorks software that CATI support has
been not only essential but never let me down."

CATI values the relationship it builds with its customers and the community, and we are very proud when one of our own is recognized on such a grand scale.

See you in San Diego next year?

SolidWorks Exploded Views

Assembly Exploded Views have been a part of SolidWorks for many releases now.  One new trick that I recently stumbled upon is that from time to time you may need to add a jog in your Exploded Line Sketches to avoid some other exploded parts.  This process is pretty straight forward but there may be a time when you want to jog following a different axis rather than the one it defaults to. For example, in screen shot 1, I show a default Axis of -X, -Y:

In image 2, I show a different axis of -Y, +Z:

And in image 3, I show yet another solution of axis +X, -Y:

This was achieved by pressing and releasing the Tab key just like in any other 3D Sketch mode inside of SolidWorks.  Pretty cool huh?  So this allows you to achieve different directions for this Jog to match your desired intent:

Or

In either case, the jog is following the axis during the creation, and you can even press and release Tab while sketching the Jog and it will cycle through options as well in 2013. So hopefully this little trick can help you make some fantastic exploded views in SolidWorks 2013. Thank you.

Brian Reel
CATI 

Automate Your Designs With DriveWorks

If you would like to find out more about Automating your
Designs or using DriveWorks Software, then
here are some links that you may find useful.

• FREE – DriveWorksXpress webinar
  – Tuesday 5th February http://www.driveworksxpress.com/index.php/training/free-webinar
  


• FREE – DriveWorks Solo webinar
  – Wednesday 6th February http://www.driveworkssolo.com/index.php/training/free-webinar
  


• TRY IT – Download and Use
  DriveWorks Solo for 30 days https://www.driveworkssolo.com/index.php/try-it
  


• How To – Want to know what’s
  involved in setting it up? - Check out these 3 minute “How to” Video Clips
  http://www.driveworkssolo.com/index.php/training/how-to
  


• ONLINE Demo – lots of examples
  online for you to try www.driveworkslive.com

Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader - Part 4

Strategy 4: Foster collaboration and innovation

A rising challenge for many design and engineering managers
is how to supervise interaction among the growing number of players in today’s
product development environment. Because innovation has become an increasingly
critical factor for manufacturing success in a global economy, more and more
contributors, each bringing different areas of specialization, are now becoming
involved in the process. While manufacturers once handled the bulk of product
development—both design and manufacturing—in-house, many now work closely with
strategic partners and vendors.

And even within a single product development group, the need
for industrial designers to collaborate with mechanical engineers, and
designers to work with analysts, and mechanical engineers to work with their
electrical and manufacturing counterparts, can test a manager’s ability to
guide this interaction into a collaborative, yet productive, workflow. The
effective CAD leader needs to consider CAD tools in the contexts of collaboration,
communication, and control.

By using an integrated suite of CAD tools, which are fully
compatible with each other, you can streamline the various interactions among
designers, engineers, partners, suppliers, and vendors. An integrated system
establishes a single design data language for all contributors.

Combined with an integrated PDM system that supports
automated workflows, integrated tools enable you to control and manage a
diverse, collaborative product development approach. By facilitating
communication among players and establishing standard workflows, you can
promote innovation in an efficient manner.

You should also consider the roles that design visualization
and data access will play in a collaborative environment. How difficult is it
for you to illustrate innovative concepts using 3D visuals and animations? Can
you easily share design ideas by email? Can you administer and control access
to sensitive design information? By carefully considering the demands of
collaboration, you can bring structure to potential chaos, and produce the
innovations your organization needs to succeed.

Read past articles:

Strategy 1: Embrace best practices and new technologies

Strategy 2: Develop skills and retain talents

Strategy 3: Maximize integration and automation

Strategy 4: Foster collaboration and innovation

Strategy 5: Focus on continuous quality improvement

Strategy 6: Leverage design data throughout the enterprise

Strategy 7: Document and analyze productivity

Strategy 8: Manage product design data efficiently

Strategy 9: Communicate effectively with business personnel

Strategy 10: Demonstrate product development contributions

Download the Whitepaper - Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader

 

*This article is an excerpt from the "Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader White Paper", published by  DS SolidWorks Corp.

How-to: Rename In-context SolidWorks Files.

By: Jim Krivoshein

 

Problem:

Renaming files that have been designed in-context and have external references can be tricky. If done incorrectly the power of the in-context items can be broken. Here we'll rename an assembly and select in-context components and maintain the in-context relationships. This stool model is designed in-context of the assembly and is driven by the first "Layout, Stool" component which is just 2D sketch profiles of the stool.

 

 

Here is a summary of the steps:

Note: Files are Not open in SolidWorks

1. Select the Assembly model in the File Explorer Tree of SolidWorks Explorer.


2. Select the Rename icon from the pop-up toolbar.


3. In the Rename Document window select "Update where used".


4. In the Rename Document window, change the name.


5. Select OK. The Assembly has been renamed.


6. With the Renamed Assembly selected in the tree, select the References tab.


7. Right click on a component to be renamed and select Rename.


8. In the Rename Document window select "Update where used".


9. In the Rename Document window, change the name of the in-context component.


10. Pick Ok. (Done)

 

SolidWorks Explorer

(Start, All Programs, SolidWorks 2013, SolidWorks Explorer)

 

This is often how SolidWorks Explorer comes up at first use. Select the small arrows at the right of the window/bar.

 

 

From the File Explorer tab expand the tree to find your files.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Once you select your file in the tree the rest of the window details will show. (See Below) We'll use the References Tab.

 

 

Select the Rename icon from the pop-up toolbar.

 

 

In the Rename Document window select "Update where used."

 

The Assembly has been renamed.

 

Right click on a component to be renamed and select Rename.

 

In the Rename Document window select "Update where used."

 

We're Done! Assembly and Part Renamed.

 

Open the Assembly in SolidWorks

 

In memory and thanks to my uncle, Dale Krivoshein, for the stool. He made it and gave it to me when I was very little. All these years later I still have it and we use it quite frequently.

 

A zip file containing the above example stool and referenced files is available for download here:Download In-Context_Design