Creating CAM with Wrap

Creating Custom Decals

This video shows you how to use custom Decals in SolidWorks 2012. 

Perspective in 3DVIA Composer

This video explains how perspective works in 3DVIA Composer. Depending on whether you zoom in and out with the mouse wheel, or by dragging while holding down the left and right mouse buttons, Composer will either change the Field Of View (FOV) or move the camera position respectively.

How to Upgrade your Solidworks installation

This is a guide for upgrading SolidWorks from one version to another - for example from SolidWorks 2011 to SolidWorks 2012. We highly recommend that you uninstall the old version completely, and then install the new version. This ensures you have a clean start with the new version.

To jump directly to the instructions, click here.

If you would like to run two major versions of SolidWorks (e.g. 2011 and 2012) alongside each other, click here.

It is not necessary to uninstall and reinstall between Service Packs, only major releases (i.e. each year). To learn how to update your SolidWorks version (e.g. go from SolidWorks 2012 SP1 to SP2) click here.

This is not intended to be a step-by-step installation guide and assumes some familiarity with basic computer maintenance, etc. If at any stage you are unsure of how to proceed, please contact your Solidtec Application Engineer.

The steps below are for standalone SolidWorks licenses. To check if you have a standalone license, from SolidWorks go to the Help menu. If you have the option to "Transfer license", you have a standalone license. If you have a network (SNL) license, most steps will be the same. If unsure, contact your Solidtec Application Engineer.

Contents

1. Before you begin
2. Uninstall the old version
3. Install the new version
4. After installation
1. Setup
2. Toolbox installations
5. Further information
   

   Before you begin

1. Back up any local data. We recommend keeping a copy of your data in the old format should you need it. More information on backups can be found here.


2. Make a note of any SolidWorks customisations, such as keyboard shortcuts. From SolidWorks >> (start a new Part if none are open) >> Tools >> Customize >> Keyboard tab >> check "Show only commands with shortcuts assigned" >> Copy List. This will copy the settings to the Windows Clipboard and you can then paste them into Excel or Notepad, etc. Although this requires you to re-input your keyboard shortcuts after reinstalling SolidWorks, there is no risk of "contaminating" the Registry settings. Do not use Copy Settings Wizard, as it copies the entire SolidWorks registry and can cause problems with the new version.


3. Copy the SolidWorks Serial Number. From SolidWorks >> Help >> About SolidWorks. Make a note of the Serial Number (copy to Notepad or write it down on paper, etc.) - you may need to re-enter it during installation later on.


4. Transfer the SolidWorks License off the machine. This ensures your license is available to use on another computer if anything happens during the uninstall/reinstall process. From SolidWorks >> Help >> Transfer License. If you are having trouble connecting to the SolidWorks License Server, make sure that internet traffic is allowed to/from https://activate.solidworks.com/


5. Make sure you are logged in to Windows as an administrator. If you are unsure, see http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch001093.htm

Uninstall the old version

6. Uninstall SolidWorks. Start Menu >> Control Panel >> Programs and Features (Add/remove programs in WinXP) >> SolidWorks >> Uninstall. The SolidWorks 2011 Installation Manager will start.


1. If you are uninstalling SolidWorks 2011, right-click on the title-bar (up the top, where it says "SolidWorks 2011 Installation Manager") >> Total Uninstall >> proceed through the IM process (keep clicking Next).


2. If you are uninstalling SolidWorks 2010 or earlier, please read the end of this post regarding how to clean your registry. It is important to do this to ensure the smooth opertation of the new version.


7. Once uninstalled, reboot the computer.

Install the new version

8. THIS IS A CRITICAL STEP! Disable any Anti-virus programs that are running as these can interfere with the installation process. Some Anti-virus programs are very difficult to disable – if in doubt Google for instructions “disable < Anti-virus Program Name>”.
   
   If required, you can generally disable anti-virus programs manually:
   
   
   
   1. Start >> Run >> Control Panel >> Administrative Tools >> Services.
   
   
   2. Find all relevant anti-virus services >> RMB >> Stop
   
   
   3. Once installation is complete >> RMB >> Start


9. Insert the SolidWorks Media Disc (make sure it is the correct bit version - 32 and 64-bit versions are supplied in the box). If the Installation Manager does not start automatically, browse to the media location in Windows Explorer and RMB on Setup.exe >> Run as administrator to begin installation.


10. Run through the Installation Manager. If the Installation Manager detects the previous install, it may ask you to upgrade - this is fine, proceed as normal.
    
    
    1. Installation type is Individual.
    
    
    2. Enter the Serial Number if prompted (enter extra Serial Numbers if installing Simulation Premium or Flow Simulation).
    
    
    3. If you have SolidWorks Professional or Premium, click here to read about installing/upgrading the Toolbox.

After installation

Setup

11. If you transferred the license off the computer previously, or there was no license on the machine, when starting up SolidWorks you will be asked to activate the product. Run through the process, using correct contact details (these will be associated with the Serial Number). If you are unable to activate, use the 30-day Trial Activation. This will give you access to SolidWorks Premium for 30 days regardless of what version of SolidWorks you are entitled to. If this happens please notify your Solidtec Application Engineer


12. Make sure that the File Locations are set up correctly if using a central file server. From within SolidWorks >> Options >> System Options tab >> File Locations. The most common locations to change are: Document Templates, Sheet Formats, Weldment Profiles and Custom Properties. To add a Custom Properties location you may need to delete the existing location first (SolidWorks can only handle one location for the Custom Properties file).


13. Apply any customisations, such as keyboard shortcuts, toolbar layouts, etc. Back these settings up using the Copy Settings Wizard.


14. Consider creating a Disc Image of your HDD, to allow for quick restoration to a known clean install state. Click here to read more.

Toolbox installations

15. If you have SolidWorks Professional or Premium with the Toolbox add-in, the correct method to update the Toolbox data is as follows:
    
    
    
    1. Browse to your existing (e.g. 2011) Toolbox data folder - by default this is in C:\SolidWorks Data.
    
    
    2. Copy the folder and its contents - rename the copied folder something like "SolidWorks Data 2012". Make another copy of the orignal folder and keep it with the rest of your backed up SW2011 data.
    
    
    3. During installation, on the Summary page under Toolbox Options >> Change. Choose to "Upgrade an existing Toolbox location" and browse to the "SolidWorks Data 2012" folder. Continue the installation process.
    
    
    4. This will upgrade the contents of the new folder, leaving the previous folder intact if you wish to continue using SolidWorks 2011. If you do not need the 2011 data anymore, you can delete the orignal "SolidWorks Data" folder.


16. If you have already installed SolidWorks and need to change the location of the Toolbox from the default local installation path to a file server path, from within SolidWorks >> Options >> System Options tab >> Hole Wizard/Toolbox >> Browse to the correct location.

Further information

Further information on installing SolidWorks can be found here:

• SolidWorks Installation and Admin Guide – the official Admin guide.
• How to ensure a clean uninstall and update of SolidWorks – a more involved method of preparing your machine for a clean SolidWorks installation.

How to install Multiple SolidWorks versions on one Computer

In this short demonstration by Perry from Solidtec, you will see how to install another version of SolidWorks alongside an already existing version. 

The method used will help keep the file references between the two versions apart. 
Please feel free to comment below.

How to determine the Volume of a Shell Feature in SolidWorks

Demo video that demonstrates how to determine the volume of a shell feature in Solidworks.

How to Activate and Transfer a SolidWorks Stand-alone license

This video explains how to activate and transfer a SolidWorks stand-alone license over the internet.

Creating a SolidWorks Customer Portal account to access free Certification Exams

This video shows you how to create a SolidWorks Customer Portal account, and how to then access vouchers for free SolidWorks Certifications, such as the Certified SolidWorks Professional exam (CSWP). The vouchers are available for anyone with a valid license of SolidWorks (single-use only).

Please note the voucher codes in this video have been obscured.

Sign up for a SolidWorks Customer Portal account for:

1. Software updates
2. SolidWorks Forums
3. SolidWorks Knowledge Base

Below are links for:

SolidWorks Certification information

SolidWorks Certification Center

How to Modify SolidWorks Hole Callouts

This video shows you how to modify the Hole Callout formats when adding callouts to holes in your drawing documents.

For a list of all Hole Callout variables, refer to the Help file.

Hole Table Padding - Adjusting beyond the standard limits

When adding Hole Tables to drawings the table often extends, vertically, beyond the limits or boundaries of the specified sheet size (see Pic_1). You may have tried to adjust the table font size and zeroed the Vertical Cell Padding dial to rectify this, but noticed that even though the padding dial is zeroed, there is still an amount of padding that remains around the text. This remaining padding takes up valuable space, let's see how we can reduce/shrink this cell padding to tightly hug the cell boundary.

Pic_1: The Problem
Before we continue, remember that we can only fit so much on to a single sheet before it becomes unreadable, so there is obvioulsy a limit to how many rows you will be able to fit vertically on a specific sheet size.

Click anywhere in the table to activate its properties. You will see this dialogue appear above the table:


Note where the adjustment settings are for Font Size and Vertical Cell Padding. We'll get back to that in a second.

Next, click on the number 2 to select the entire row. Hold down the Shift key and select the last row in your table (I had sixty rows all up in this example). You should now have all rows except the heading row selected. With all rows selected you can change your font size; I have used 9, which is still quite readable and then we want to adjust the Vertical Cell Padding.

You will note though, that when you dial down (using the up-down arrow toggles) you will be stopped at zero. Naturally you will think this to be the limit, but alas, we know with Solidworks anything is possible. Simply select the Vertical Cell Padding field as below...

Type negative 1.8 i.e. -1.8 and hit the Enter key on your keyboard. You should now be looking something like this in the settings dialogue...

and your cell text will be hugging the cell borders all nice and cosy, like this:

And while we are at it, quickly click anywhere in the table, then click the black cross to the left of Column A to activate the table properties dialogue, which will appear to the left of your screen. We want to tidy things up a little before printing. In the properties dialogue select "Combine same sizes" and you will get this:

In the properties dialogue, click the green check mark to close and we're done.


You should now have your table fitting nicely onto your drawing sheet and looking much better than when we started.

Have a play with those settings and I hope that this has helped you somewhat to tidy up those Hole Tables.

How to place a point at the Center of Mass

How to place a point at the Center of Mass of a solid and add reference planes through the point so that they update as the solid changes.
 

How to model a Spiral Staircase

How to use SolidWorks RX

SolidWorks RX is a diagnostic utility that you can use to record a video of an issue you may be having in SolidWorks. Apart from capturing a video of the cause of the problem, RX also captures information regarding your system including SolidWorks and Windows log files that can help determine the cause of a problem.

1. Save all open SolidWorks documents and close SolidWorks
2. Start Menu >> All Programs >> SolidWorks 20XX >> SolidWorks Tools >> SolidWorks RX
3. Problem Capture >> Record video
4. Show all steps to recreate the problem
5. Once finished, close SolidWorks (if it does not crash)
6. In SolidWorks RX >> Describe the problem (minimal detail is fine)
7. Add any relevant files with the Add Files button
8. Package Files
9. Email the ZIP file to your support engineer

If you cannot reproduce your error on demand – i.e. SolidWorks is crashing often, but randomly, start RX directly after SolidWorks has crashed (do NOT start SolidWorks up again). You can then skip steps 3 - 5 and when you package the files, RX will capture the last Journal file which should explain the cause of the crash.

Be aware that the Problem Capture page looks a bit different from version to version, but the process is generally the same.

SolidWorks 2012 Beta

SolidWorks 2012 Beta was released a few days ago for subscription customers. Participating in the Beta program is one of the best ways directly influence the development of the SolidWorks software.

1. Log in to the Customer Portal (creating a new account only takes a minute if you don’t have one).
2. My Profile >> Notify me for Beta Programs >> Save >> Home
3. Download >> Downloads and Updates >> select 2012 from the drop-down >> download and install the SW2012 Beta (install it alongside your current version).
4. Head over to the Beta home page and the Forums to find out what’s new and give feedback – this forum is checked by the SW Development team regularly, and they may seek out feedback in specific areas.

Remember, the Beta software is not production-ready – don’t use it for mission critical projects as you may uncover some bugs in the software. In fact, if you report your bugs (aka SPR’s) through the Beta page, you can earn points and win prizes.

Also keep in mind that as with all future versions of SolidWorks, if you save files in 2012 you won’t be able to open them in 2011 or earlier versions – so make copies of the files you wish to use.

How to model a Fancy Tube in SolidWorks.

How to use SolidWorks to create a fancy tube that spirals around an odd shape former.

Total cost of cutlists

Multi-tasking with Windows Task Manager

You’ve just set a long render or simulation study going, and now that your computer is locked up calculating all those 0’s and 1’s, there’s nothing to do but go and get a coffee.

Not so fast. If you’ve got a multi-core machine, you can use Windows Task Manager (in all versions of Windows) to free up one of the cores for other programs, allowing you to check emails, surf the web, watch YouTube, etc. The trade-off is that your render/simulation will take longer to solve – the more cores you have, the less this will matter.

1. After your Simulation study/render is started, start Task Manager by pressing CTRL+ALT+DEL, or Start >> Run >> “taskmgr” (without the quotes).
2. Click on the Processes tab and sort by Name – this tab shows all of the processes running in the background on your machine.
3. For rendering, find PV360.exe, for Simulation, find Star.exe (this is after meshing, when the study has started solving)
4. RMB on the process >> Set Affinity...
5. Uncheck one of the CPU cores – it doesn’t matter which one.

This stops Windows from assigning work from that process to that CPU core. It’s only temporary, so if you start another render, you will need to go through the above steps again.

Alternatively, you can change the priority of a process:

4. (From step 4 above) RMB >> Set Priority >> set to Below Normal or Low

Changing the priority lower means that instructions being sent from PV360 to the CPU are solved after instructions sent from other processes such as your web browser. After doing this, your computer should function as normally expected, and the render will continue in the background.

You can change priority or affinity at any time while a process is running – this is handled by Windows in the background and won’t affect your render or simulation study.

The benefit of changing priority over setting affinity is that if you’re only using 3% of the available CPU power to check the web, 97% is devoted to finishing the render. If the CPU is quad-core, and we set the PV360 affinity to only 3 cores, it would only be using 75% of the full CPU processing power, regardless of what we are doing.

However, setting affinity ensures you have spare processing power, and often, even if you set the priority of a processor-hungry process like PV360 to Low, you may notice some performance issues trying to do other tasks (you’d be surprised how much processing is required to run YouTube in your browser), so I generally prefer to set affinity.

As a final alternative, if it they can wait, you can use SolidWorks Task Scheduler to schedule renders and studies to run when you aren’t using the computer – e.g. at night. This will be covered in another post.

Printing Drawings in colour using CutePDF

Colour can be used to good effect in drawings to increase clarity - for example by differentiating between dimension lines, model lines and annotations. Under Document Properties, you can assign new annotations to different layers, and assign colours per layer.

However, when it comes time to print, sometimes it’s difficult to get those colours to come through in the printout. Here’s how to do it with CutePDF Writer, a program which emulates a printer in Windows, but creates a PDF file rather than a physical print out.

Firstly, download and install CutePDF Writer: http://www.cutepdf.com/

From your SolidWorks drawing:

1. File >> Page Setup >> set Drawing Colour to Color/Gray Scale >> OK
2. File >> Print... >> select CutePDF Writer as the printer >> Properties >> Advanced (bottom right on the Paper/Quality tab)
3. Graphic >> Image Color Management >> click on ICM Method >> select “ICM handled by Host System” >> OK >> OK
4. Set your other print options and then print. You will be prompted to save the drawing as a PDF file on your computer.

If you are having trouble physically printing a drawing in colour, try printing it to PDF as above then printing the PDF. Alternatively, when printing, select your printer >> Properties, and locate the option that tells the printer to allow SolidWorks to handle the colour. Since each printer driver is different, you may need to refer to your printer manual or the manufacturers website to find the correct option.

Documenting Part Configurations in a Drawing

This video shows you one way to document a number of different part configurations on the same drawing, using Custom Properties to capture the dimensions that change across the configurations, and a BOM in a drawing to display those dimensions.

Using Disc Cloning to minimise computer down-time

If you’re setting up a new computer for SolidWorks, here are some recommendations that may save a lot of hassle in future if you experience any problems. Disc cloning tools create “snapshots” that you can use to revert to at the first sign of trouble. Wikipedia maintains a list of disc cloning software:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_disk_cloning_software

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_disk_cloning_software

If you already have your computer set up, and it’s running nicely, you can also make use of disc cloning software to create a restore point for your system.

Firstly, create a Windows partition using disc partitioning software. This partition should contain Windows and Program files only.

All data (SolidWorks files, documents, music, videos, etc.) should be saved to a separate partition. This ensures that if Windows or any programs become corrupt, you can format the Windows partition without affecting your data.

With a fresh install of Windows 7 requiring upwards of 6Gb, plus space for installation of programs (SolidWorks can require up to approx. 7Gb) and the inevitable Windows growth (my current C:\Windows directory is a tad over 20Gb), you should make sure the partition is a minimum of around 40Gb. Thankfully, HDD space is cheap these days.

After the disc is partitioned, install Windows. Once done, create a series of disc “images” using the disc cloning software:

• A fresh Windows install (with latest updates applied, basic drivers, etc.). No user settings or extra software installed.

• All of the above, plus applying user settings, network settings, software (Office, Outlook, etc.). No SolidWorks.

• Above, plus SolidWorks, but with no SolidWorks user settings applied.

You can then set up SolidWorks as you wish and save the settings using the SolidWorks Copy Settings Wizard. These settings should be redone from scratch for each major release (i.e. when upgrading from SW2010 to SW2011) to ensure your SolidWorks registry does not become corrupted.

While heavily compressed, these image files will still be quite large. I would suggest keeping the clean SolidWorks image on your machine for quick access, but also copying all of the images to an external HDD and keeping it off-site for safety.

It is OK to uninstall and upgrade SolidWorks normally, rather than reverting back to the previous image. The idea of the images is to provide various levels of a "clean slate" should there be any particularly stubborn or unresolvable computer issues.

MAKE SURE YOU TRANSFER YOUR SOLIDWORKS LICENSE OFF YOUR MACHINE BEFORE REVERTING TO AN EARLIER IMAGE

It is still a good idea to “rebuild” your machine from the first, clean Windows image on a semi-regular basis, to ensure a continued smooth operation of Windows and SolidWorks. After each rebuild, make sure you create new images of your Windows partition as per the above steps.