Automatically flatten and document sheet metal designs for manufacturing using SOLIDWORKS 3D CAD software, speeding up design, saving time and development costs, and increasing productivity.

Sheet Metal Bending and Flat Pattern Overview

SOLIDWORKS enables you to automatically flatten your sheet metal design with bend allowance and document it for manufacturing. Flattening provides a first check of manufacturability for sheet metal parts.

The flattened drawing view can contain all needed manufacturing information, including:

• Bend allowance/bend deduction information to ensure proper blank sizing for manufacturing
• Punch tables, hole tables, bend table, weld table as required
• Forming tool features, placement sketches, bend lines
• Preview of complex flatten patterns, using Toggle Flat Display

CAD Check for Parts and Tooling Overview

SOLIDWORKS enables automatic checks for draft, undercut, and wall thickness issues in molded, cast, and forged parts and tooling. Parts and tooling checks help identify and resolve potential problems early in the part or tooling design process. CAD check for parts and tooling functionality includes:

• Draft Analysis—Determine if a part is drafted sufficiently considering the material selected for removal from the mold or forging tool
• Undercut Analysis—Determine if an undercut feature is present in a part so it can be understood and fixed, or removed (if undesired), or designed into the tooling so that the undercut feature can be produced
• Parting Line Analysis—Review the part line selection for the target direction of pull for plastic, cast, or forged parts
• Thickness Check—Automatically calculate and graphically display part thickness so the designer can focus on areas where molding problems are likely to occur
• Symmetry Check—Run symmetry checks that help streamline tooling construction by helping engineers select preliminary gating locations and common areas that can be manufactured together

DFMXpress Overview

SOLIDWORKS DFMXpress analysis tool validates the manufacturability of parts designed with SOLIDWORKS. Use DFMXpress to identify design areas that might cause problems during fabrication or increase production costs, and quickly review parts with mill, drill, turning, sheet metal, and injection molding requirements.

DFMXpress functionality includes:

• Drilled hole checks—hole diameter-to-depth ratio, flat bottoms on holes, perpendicular entry surfaces, holes that intersect internal cavities, partial holes, tolerance checks
• Milled feature checks—deep pockets and slots, inaccessible features, sharp internal corners, fillets on outside edges
• Turned part checks—minimum corner radii for turned parts, bore relief for turned parts
• Sheet metal checks—hole diameters vs. available tooling, hole-to-edge distance, hole spacing, bend radii
• Standard hole size checks—checks hole vs. available tooling
• Injection molding checks—maximum and minimum wall checks
• Checks for draft, undercuts, and advanced thickness analysis are also included in SOLIDWORKS and can be found by clicking the “Evaluate” tab
• Simulation of plastic mold filling is available in SOLIDWORKS Plastics