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When you’re creating a design in SOLIDWORKS, it can get very complicated quickly. Going from 1, 10 or even 1,000 parts in an assembly can happen in the blink of an eye. Working on complex assemblies with multiple systems and collaborating between many designers can be a challenge, especially when work needs to reference other sub-assemblies. Now, with SOLIDWORKS 2020, you can use the new Envelope Publisher tool to make dealing with complex, large assemblies easy.

TriMech is fortunate to work with clients from Maine to Florida and out to Arkansas, offering a range of engineering solutions. This week's client story showcases how TriMech's Project Engineering Group (PEG) helped Digital Projections improve their display frames designs using SOLIDWORKS. 

Rigid flexible components are one of the most talked-about additions to SOLIDWORKS 2020. With this feature, you can visualize the movement of your design like never before. Things like springs, living hinges, cables and bellows come to life.

Recently we have seen STL and mesh files make their way into mainstream modeling workflows. As a result, in every release for the past few years, SOLIDWORKS has been making it easier to work with imported mesh and graphical geometry. Now, with SOLIDWORKS 2020 it’s even better.

Have you ever wanted to change several design parameters with one action? Linking dimensions in SOLIDWORKS reduces design time by allowing variable change simultaneously. This means that if you change one dimension, any other dimensions that are synchronized will be changed as well. There are two ways to go about this: Link Values and Global Variables.

“This is how we’ve always done it.”

Your current process might have helped define your success years ago, but is it honestly still relevant in today’s global and more technology-empowered competitive landscape? How much time and effort could you save by taking a fresh look at something as simple as communication between your product development teams? A lot, as it turns out!

FeatureWorks is a SOLIDWORKS Standard, Professional and Premium add-on that allows engineers and designers to directly interact with and edit imported part data in a SOLIDWORKS part file. Imported models, or “dumb solids”, become useable parts within the SOLIDWORKS 3D CAD environment.

Ready to maximize your efficiency in the new year? These free resources are great for identifying small improvements for your day to-day task or finding solutions that address an engineering, design or manufacturing challenge. We have compiled a list of helpful options when it comes to learning more or just needing a reference. Whether you only have a few minutes or you are ready for a week long course, we have resources created by industry experts at your fingertips.

Instead of struggling to convert CAD files from third-party systems, 3D Interconnect is used as an add-on feature to SOLIDWORKS Professional and Premium that allows users to interact with third-party CAD data directly inside of SOLIDWORKS.

The set of standards used for drawing and dimensioning your parts in SOLIDWORKS is known as the Drawing Template, similar to Part and Assembly templates. SOLIDWORKS drawings consist of two distinct layers, the sheet and sheet format. These both make up the drawing template. In addition, any changes you’ve made to the Document Properties will also carry over to the drawing template once that template is saved. The drawing template, sheet and sheet format all combine to make up the drawing file (*.slddrw). In this blog article, we show you how to set up your Drawing template.

Having spent some time working at a local battery company started from Carnegie Mellon, I saw firsthand as a SOLIDWORKS user how companies in the energy sector utilize the software. It would be very narrow-minded to exclude the totality of this industry. There are many products in the SOLIDWORKS portfolio, if leveraged properly, that can be powerful for those in the industry, from oil/gas, hydroelectric power generation, hydrogen power and many more. During my time at the battery company, I utilized the SOLIDWORKS mechanical design suite of products including the basics with sketching, product and assembly design to the more advanced capabilities and SOLIDWORKS validation products. In this blog, I go through a very high-level overview of the tools most likely to be used by a designer in this field.

As a SOLIDWORKS user, I am always excited when new software features and enhancements are released every year. The more I use the software, the more I realize how valuable these updates are and how much they improve my experience. Features such as customizing mouse buttons or accessing drawing arcs help me save time and add more details to my designs. In this blog post, I share with you my top ten personal favorite SOLIDWORKS features and why I am thankful for them.