With traditional 2D CAD, drawings are often out of date and/or drawing views do not accurately reflect the design, leading to expensive manufacturing errors that slow down product delivery. Without an automated update system, all drawing views must be updated manually whenever a design change occurs. This becomes an even bigger problem when a component or assembly exists in many different assemblies or at many different levels of the same assembly, because it requires that all the drawing views containing the modified components be updated.

SOLIDWORKS drawing capabilities include:

• Automatic Drawing View creation and update—Drag and drop the 3D model onto a drawing for automatic generation of drawing views with automatic update of changes to the 3D model
• CAD Dimensioning, Tolerancing and Annotations—SOLIDWORKS includes standard ANSI, ISO, GD&T, and other dimensioning methods
• Bill of Materials (BOM)—Automatically generate parts lists and cut lists to track material needs
• CAD Standards checking (Design Checker)—Compare your drawings to company standards to ensure consistency using the SOLIDWORKS Design Checker tool
• Revision control—Control drawing revisions and graphically compare drawings to identify differences
• Automated Creation of Radial/Cylindrical Exploded Views - Significantly speed up the creation of exploded views for designs that have fasteners and components positioned radially/cylindrically around an axis

With SOLIDWORKS, you get an intuitive 3D CAD system that combines ease-of-use with powerful modeling capabilities that can handle your most complex design projects. SOLIDWORKS accelerates your design, saving time and development costs, and making you more productive.

SOLIDWORKS capabilities include:

• 3D solid modeling–turn ideas and concepts into virtual 3D models
• Conceptual design–begin 3D designs quickly using imported images, simple sketches, or scanned 3D data, and then add more details as the design evolves
• Assembly Structure Planning: SOLIDWORKS Treehouse – quickly lay out your design assembly structure and then export to SOLIDWORKS to automatically create your CAD files
• Direct Model Editing–manipulate and modify 3D geometry working directly on the 3D CAD model
• Large assembly design–performance tools to handle even your biggest and most complex products and systems
• Advanced surface design–generate complex organic shapes, including curve continuous (C2) surfaces
• Sheet metal design–create sheet metal parts that can be easily manufactured
• Weldments–quickly develop structural supports, frames, brackets, and bases
• Plastic Part design–create plastic parts that can be easily molded
• CAD Productivity Tools–special capabilities that help you work faster
• Reverse engineering–work from 3D scan data generated from existing designs to speed new product creations
• Mold design–generate molds and tooling to produce plastic, cast, and forged parts
• Piping and tubing design–complete your design by adding hydraulic, pneumatic, and other systems
• Electrical cable harness and conduit design–include necessary control, power, and other electrical systems in your design

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