SolidWorks 2004 Top Ten List
By Keith Schaefer, Technical Analyst, Computer Aided Technology
 

Move and Rotate Components
Move and rotate components by dragging them in the graphics area without opening a property manager or dialog box. No more popping back and forth to get the move and rotate tool. And for a added bonus hold down the Alt key when you are dragging a component and it doubles as the mate tool.

Lightweight subassemblies and lightweight drawings
Extension of the lightweight capabilities. Now includes the ability to load all of you subassemblies lightweight. This is a huge benefit for large assembly users. The ability to load your entire drawing lightweight, and still be able to section detail and dimension off of the lightweight drawing.

H
Hole Tables
Select a face and click insert hole tables.  SolidWorks will create a hole table that includes all of the holes on the face that you selected. It will use the hole wizard definition or your custom input to describe the hole in question.  The table is fully customizable to get just the look that you wanted.

Mold design Tools
Creates molds with a sequence of tools
that allows for control of the entire mold
creation process. 

Includes:

• Core and Cavity
• Parting Line (Even nonplanar)

• Parting Surface

• Shut off surfaces

SolidWorks Task Scheduler
Setup tasks to run at a future time.  Includes batch import, batch export, plotting, edrawing creation, even drawing creation!

Weldment Design Tools
Design structural and plate weldments in a single part document, and don’t sweat the details.  The weldment tools include the ability to quickly and easily create:

• End Caps

• Fillet Weld Beads

• Gussets

• Structural Members Library

• Trim and Extend Structural
  Members

• Weldment cut lists

A
Auto Balloon
Single click automatic ballooning of a drawing view.  No more counting balloons and searching for parts to find the one balloon that you missed.  Puts all of your balloons in the first time every time.

UI enhancements
SolidWorks made significant changes the user interface to make modeling and drawing more intuitive than it ever has before.  Just a couple of the things to look for in the new release are:

• The new command manager

• Customizable right click menus

• The new mating shortcut bar.

• The make drawing from current document icon

• The make assembly from current document icon

SolidWorks Routing
Used to quickly and easily create piping assemblies, now includes flexible tubing.

Materials Interface
The ability to define a parts material is now in a materials chooser property manager.  When a parts material is chosen it will automatically apply:

• Finish (graphically to model)

• Color

• Crosshatch

• Density

• Elastic Modulus

• Poissons Ratio

• Yield Strength