14 comments

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  Marijn

  11 months ago

  You forgot the best one:
  Follow this blog![put rss here]
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  Josh M

  11 months ago

  Ha! Right on Marijn. Here's the RSS Feed - http://feeds.feedburner.com/solidsmack
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  Ivan

  11 months ago

  Yes, I too have seen parts drawn in thin air, not locked down to anything.... why oh why... I can't stand blue (undefined) sketches. My tip for drawings is to put yourself in the clients shoes, or manufacturer, etc... and see what info they will need. I know that sounds obvious but I've seen many 'newer' users leave important stuff out and put in useless info (re: your tip, keep it simple). I make it a habit to look back at the big picture and pretend I've never seen this project before, and does everything make sense, is it all clear. I see many things easily cause I've been working with the 3D model all day, not so for the shop guys.
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  Rod_Uding

  11 months ago

  Most excellent post Mr Ming. I think I abide by most of tips posted. The ones I have not been doing and should are the "Use Sketch Patterns to Control Features" and "Create a Library".
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  Soup

  11 months ago

  A few additional tips:
  
  * Think about how you build a part and assemblies. Make sure that if you need to change one of them in the future, the file does light up the feature tree in red. Modeling is as much a thought process, as it is a raw shape manipulation. The Theory of Parametic Modeling is to be respected.
  
  * Learn differing ways to model. One example is:
  -Cut away - like taking a block of clay of overall size of object, and cutting away until the object is created. Very handy to do if you are making a "family" of complex parts.
  
  * Lock as much as you can down. Sketches most importantly. They control how your model will react to dimensional changes. Not locking down the sketch, means the model may react in unpredictable ways. It is best to make the relationships in relation to things that are constant. I prefer origin, planes, and axises.
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• 

  Bruce Buck

  11 months ago

  I thought feature patterns rebuilt faster than sketch patterns? Is this not the case anymore?
  
  Blue.....BLUUUUEE! Ah that picture brought back memories
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  Josh M

  11 months ago

  yeah, but some patterns you just can't do with feature patterns. I'd prefer the feature patterns, but I guess I was aiming at the exception for when you need to pattern items that are not in a straight line or circle.
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• 

  Cheech

  11 months ago

  1. Tree view:
  I always like to keep it neat and clean:
  I start with the most relevant assemblies then the most relevant parts, then, least relevant assemblies and parts. Whenever there’s a group of parts & assemblies that didn’t get their own sub-assembly, I like to open a special folder for it. Sometimes it’s also nice to save screws and bolts in a “fasteners” folder.
  
  2. Assemblies:
  You should always minimize the number of patterns, if 2 patterns can fit into one feature, then why not?
  (2b) Also, it's always better to use a feature pattern instead of linear/circular pattern, if it's possible.
  
  3. Sketches:
  It’s impossible to suppress an entity, so instead you can use “for geometry” so that you can save a group of entities without using them physically in your model.
  
  4. Post design:
  After you finish your design there’s a chance that your parts/assemblies will be used some place else (another project). You should remove these links (mates/relations) because they tend to brake when you use them in a different project (turning from -> to ->?). so you should go to all features that include the -> symbol and start replacing the mate/relation with an autonomous one. For example, instead of using an “equal” relation between an entity in your sketch and an edge in another part, you should use a dimension that “locks” the length of the entity. This way it’s possible to use you parts in other projects. This step is efficient usually in the post design step because you’re “killing” the relations between parts/assemblies in your project.
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  Josh M

  11 months ago

  Wow, really good list of tips Cheech. I like the idea about having a post design review, although I think it depends on getting rid of the in-context relations. Makes sense if it will be re-used, but going through that process should wait till no more changes could happen. THanks!
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  Cheech

  11 months ago

  By the way, is that kramer on the picture?
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  Josh M

  11 months ago

  Yep, THE Michael Richards back in 1989 in the Movie UHF with Weird Al. That scene where he turns the firehose on is great!
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• 

  ian

  11 months ago

  model tree: Oh for the love of god please re-name the features you create. It drives me up the wall when i open a complicated part that someone wants me to modify and all of their extrudes are named exturde1-10^293487123
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  Josh M

  11 months ago

  That's a great one Ian! That drives me crazy too.
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  Eric

  9 months ago

  1. Rename datum planes in templates as XY, XZ, YZ. "Front", "Side", and "Top" have no meaning to me, and SolidWorks has an XYZ coordinate system, so why hide it behind arbitrary names? I use capital letters for assembly datums, and lower case for part datums.
  
  2. Add datum axes X-axis, Y-axis, Z-axis to templates. The axes are very useful for feature design and mating.
  
  3. Name features (mentioned above). This helps future users, plus yourself once tree gets long.
  
  4. Use Comments. This is really helpful for identifying the purpose of obscure datum planes or features that you don't want to accidentally delete when you are cleaning up the tree. I wish there was an option to "LOCK" features so they couldn't be deleted without the comment popping up.
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