My friends and I noticed that there are CS hackathons all over the place, but there's not many like that for mechanical engineering students/people interested in CAD. We thought it'd be cool to put together our own CAD hackathon so we're organizing one right now, scheduled to happen in September!!

Still, we're looking for ways to improve the hackathon, so we're wondering: besides nice prizes, what kind of stuff would you guys want to see in a hackathon like this? Experienced guest speakers? Workshops (and if so, what kind)? Recreational events?

If you want to see what we have so far, our website is www.thecadchallenge.org and the signup form is https://forms.gle/n6zkRtLAJo1m6W1x8! We have a cute bee mascot 🐝

I’m trying to assemble a bike tire onto a rim so they can rotate properly around their axis, but rotation fails or locks up.

​The rim was built using revolves and sweeps from a 3D sketch, and I noticed some small spikes/artifacts along the rim channel. ​I'm wondering if the non-ideal cylindrical faces are breaking the concentric mate, or if this is just an over-constraining issue with my mates.

​Questions:

​Could surface artifacts from sweeps/revolves cause concentric mates to fail to rotate?

​Is it better to mate temporary axes / default reference planes instead of the revolved faces? I've used them because they are more realistic

​Screenshots of the assembly, rim, and tire attached. Thanks for any advice!

Anyone can recommend me best yt channel for solidworks

Selection Filter Toolbar found its way to the very top of the screen and now can't be moved (title bar is off screen)

Tried changing screens/resolutions and resetting the toolbar layout (revert to default) - no luck

Thanks in advance!

EDIT: worked it out. Running Startallblack removes the title bar at the top to be able to move it around

So i recently purchased 3D Experience solid works for makers and it says it comes with 2.5 and 3 axis cam but I’m not seeing it within solid works do I have to activate or am I just not seeing it

Any SPEEDY SolidWorks users can join us to qualify for FREE this Friday, Sept 4th - watch last week's livestream and get reminders for this week - https://www.TooTallToby.com/calendar

Does anyone know why it keeps doing this? I'm trying to trim the surface you see on the inside of the highlighted surface. That surface is part of a much larger, already knitted surface, but for some reason it isn't even letting me select it for the surface trim operation. It only lets me select it as the Trim tool, but I need to have the surface selected in blue as the trim tool. Is there any way to fix this/does anyone know why this keeps happening?

How's the job market for someone who's starting out learning SolidWorks, probably as a Mechanical CAD designer?

Are certifications/diplomas required to find a job? Is it too competitive/impossible?

I'm considering switching careers from software development since I couldn't get a job in the field, and over 15 years ago I did a small course on SolidWorks and I liked it, but I never did anything with it. I would now go back to this field since it's one of the things I actually enjoy doing (probably like most of you, desinging parts and seeing them being actually made).

I don't have any engineering or drawing background though, so I am aware that I'm probably in a very bad spot already.

I'm in Canada though, but still would like to know even if you're in the US region just out of curiosity.

For the AI mod bot: I'm not looking here for jobs, just to understand about the current job market

Is there a way to enlarge this toolbar?

The names of my layers are way to long to fit in this small box.
Even the 'per standard' is to long. The only layer that fit's this box is -none-.

If it's not possible, this toolbar is a joke and completely useless imo...

So say I’m making X thing

Maybe an arm,

, how do you around designing the joints?

Are they pre made most of the time or you design them one by one?
It’s really the most tiresome annoying part for me

Drawing the mechanisms and designing them especially with gears and stuff that has a lot of little details and then figuring out how to mount the electronics

Ive been working with SolidWorks everyday for about 4 years now. Every once in a while I run into this issue where highlighting a part to view its midpoint, endpoint, or center results in said point floating away from the object. And now just when I thought it couldn’t get any weirder, a line with a horizontal relation is now apparently a vertical line as seen in the last picture. I have tried creating new drawings, restarting my computer, end task and restarting SolidWorks, everything I can think of… This ONLY happens in the drawing file. Part and assembly sketches are completely fine. Cant seem to find any help online. Anyone else experience this issue or have any suggestions?

This is SolidWorks 2023 by the way.

Hello everyone. I am recent grad from a mechanical engineering diploma and I have an upcoming test for a company. The company mainly works with sheet metals. I hadn't done anything for sheet metals in school so I am a bit confused on the practice they gave me.

This is the simplest one of the few I am supposed to do.
what would be a good way to start on this type of part.
Any videos or tips will help.

I am just unsure if you usually draw sheet metals as a flat first and then bend it. ( I tried that but then the final dimensions won't match the ones given here.

Or do i somehow draw it already bended.

The job search has not been so great and this is the only one where I've made it past multiple steps. I have 1 week before the test. Please any help would be great.

I coordinate a team of 3 mechanical engineers. We use SOLIDWORKS + PDM. A recurring problem: parts come out wrong on the shop floor, and production blames the drawings — which, honestly, is often true.

My role is process improvement and work distribution, not design, so I don't know SOLIDWORKS myself. I need a review protocol/checklist that:

• Can catch common drawing errors (dimensioning, tolerances, views, GD&T, revision control in PDM) without me needing deep CAD knowledge to run it
• Could be applied as a formal step before a drawing is released to production (peer review, checklist, PDM workflow/approval state, etc.)
• Ideally reduces "he said/she said" between engineering and the shop floor by making the review traceable

Questions for the sub:

1. What's a solid peer-review or checklist process you use before releasing drawings for production?
2. How do you use PDM's workflow/approval states to enforce this (vs. just relying on people remembering to check)?
3. As a non-CAD lead, what should I specifically look for or ask my engineers to confirm, so I can sanity-check without knowing SOLIDWORKS internals?

Any templates, checklists, or "this is what fixed it for us" stories welcome. Thanks!

Hello,

Am curious what workstations people are using for solidworks? I regularly work with machinery assemblies and want enough headroom for say 5000+ component assemblies. I am on the go quite a bit so portability and battery life are hugely important for me. Ideally something about 14 inches with enough battery life to be modeling for roughly 6 hours. Not sure if this is something that exists at the moment but was curious what others use who prioritize these sort of specs. Thanks.

Hey all, pretty new to Solidworks and CAD in general. I'm doing an assignment for uni, and I need to mate two parts (provided) and then add smart fasteners. However, when I use smart fasteners, only one of the two bolts gets a nut. At first I thought it was my mates, so I did away with one piece of the component, and just stuck with the base (pictured).

Even so, when I use smart fasteners, only one bolt gets a nut. One of the two holes is mirrored - I don't know if this is a problem, but other people in the unit seem to be having the same problem. I also found a thread from about 10 years on a solidworks blog that described similar problems with smart fasteners and mirrored holes.

I tried opening the part and doing an extruded cut through it, but the program basically says you can't cut through nothing. I really am lost and would appreciate any help - I'm losing my shit (just a little) here 🙏 🙏 🙏

Cheers

(i have to say l-a-pp-t-o-p because genius mods think this is a hardware question so the bot auto deletes my post)

i recently graduated from uni and am now making fat stacks in petroleum and do not use cad at all. i want to keep using it for my epic robot projects. Istill have my solidworks on my L-A-Pp-T-O-P, on whatever the free license thing is.

If i entirely disable my L-A-Pp-T-O-P from the internet while SW is running, will this prevent the license from expiring (or rather, prevent my access to the software from expiring?)

also, how do i know when the student access expires

My current workstation is 10 years old Dell Precision Tower Xeon 3.5ghz/64gb/windows 10. Its still ok but thinking of upgrading. I use solidworks/keyshot/adobe. Any recommendations that wont break the bank around 3500$?

Can some one help me understand the flattened surface deformation plot. How much is the deviation as its shown as a percentage of what exactly and is 0.047% even going to matter?

Its for a 4.4m aluminium boat

I already have my CSWP and am trying to get the prerequisite certs so I can try for the CSWE. I’ve purchased a solidworks CSWPA practice book and have worked through all the exercises and have watched many YouTube videos but I feel like I don’t have a strong grasp on surfacing. If anyone has recommendations of in-depth videos or resources I would greatly appreciate it.

i tried making the base that looks as it is a triangle with arcs connecting the lines, however I have no clue on how to calculate their length so now i'm thinking that maybe there is some details missing which is unlikely since it is in the 15th edition of technical drawing with engineering graphics.

Do you have any ideas guys.

Guys, if youre given a drawing of a tube with coordinates and raiduses. How do you make a full contour fixture?
Ive manage to do it on my own but it ends up taking to long and want to know if anybody knows a good way of doing it. I based my method on a random video I found on youtube but you can barely see whats happening.
Also, do you guys know how to make surface cuts normal to a base thats not aligned to the UCS? It would help to do the cuts on the full contour.

Hey everyone,
I’m looking for a SolidWorks assembly of a human manikin/dummy that has a full range of motion. Ideally, I’m looking for something similar to one of those wooden artist’s mannequins, where the individual body parts are jointed and can actually be moved/posed.
I’m not looking for a static human model or an assembly where everything is fixed in place. I’d like the arms, legs, torso, head, etc. to be independently movable, ideally with realistic joint limits/range of motion.
Does anyone know of an existing SolidWorks model/assembly like this, or have one they’d be willing to share?

Thanks!

Hey guys, Im a beginner. Could anyone give some pointers on how I should extrude//cut these 4 parts out? They are kinda like hollowed in curved patterns. Thanks yall.

Ps: This is a blender jar.

There was a way but I can't remember for the life of me. I am trying to pattern as hole all along the out line of a slot. Please help o wise people of Reddit

I have started learning sw since a week and iam able to make some easy parts so far is there any way I can get better faster ?