Book Image

Learn SOLIDWORKS - Second Edition

By : Tayseer Almattar
Book Image

Learn SOLIDWORKS - Second Edition

By: Tayseer Almattar

Overview of this book

SOLIDWORKS is the leading choice for 3D engineering and product design applications across industries such as aviation, automobile, and consumer product design. This book helps you to get up and running with SOLIDWORKS and understand each new concept and tool with the help of easy-to-follow exercises. You'll begin with the basics, exploring the software interface and finding out how to work with drawing files. The book then guides you through topics such as sketching, building complex 3D models, generating dynamic and static assemblies, and generating 2D engineering drawings to prepare you to take on any design project. You'll also work with practical exercises to get hands-on experience with creating sketches, 3D part models, assemblies, and drawings. To reinforce your understanding of SOLIDWORKS, the book is supplemented by downloadable files that will help you to understand the concepts and exercises more easily. Finally, you'll also work on projects for 3D modeling objects inspired by everyday life. By the end of this SOLIDWORKS book, you'll have gained the skills you need to create professional 3D mechanical models using SOLIDWORKS and be able to prepare effectively for the Certified SOLIDWORKS Associate (CSWA) and Certified SOLIDWORKS Professional (CSWP) exams.
Table of Contents (26 chapters)
1
Section 1 – Getting Started
4
Section 2 – 2D Sketching
7
Section 3 – Basic Mechanical Core Features – Associate Level
10
Section 4 – Basic Evaluations and Assemblies – Associate Level
13
Section 5 – 2D Engineering Drawings Foundation
18
Section 6 – Advanced Mechanical Core Features – Professional Level
21
Section 7 – Advanced Assemblies – Professional Level

Getting started with SOLIDWORKS sketching

In this section, we will discuss how to start sketching, what it means to define a sketch, and what the major geometrical relations that exist in SOLIDWORKS sketching are. These topics will be our practical introduction to getting into SOLIDWORKS sketching.

Getting into the sketching mode

To start a sketch, we need to have a part file open. Then, we can follow these steps to get into the sketching mode:

  1. Select one of the default sketch planes: Front, Top, or Right.
  2. In the CommandManager, select the Sketch option (which is marked as 2 in Figure 3.9). This will open up the Sketch commands category, which will show all the commands related to sketching.
  3. Select the Sketch command (which is marked as 3 in Figure 3.9). This will allow us to enter the sketching mode. When we're in the sketching mode, we can apply different sketching commands, such as the marked Simple sketching commands:

Figure...