It’s here! SOLIDWORKS 2021 Beta 1 is now available. It’s time to take SOLIDWORKS 2021 for a test drive, check out the new enhancements and participate in the Beta program. What is the Beta Program? Participating in the Beta program is more than just taking the next release of SOLIDWORKS for a test drive. It’s about connecting with the BETA community, interacting with the SOLIDWORKS R&D team to provide your feedback on the new functionality and flexing your SOLIDWORKS skills […]
Silhouette Entities is a powerful new sketch tool that was added in SOLIDWORKS 2020 and has not yet received the full credit it deserves. I expect plenty of seasoned designers might not be aware of it. Hopefully, this post will help change that and develop up some appreciation for Silhouette Entities. We will explore this command by comparing it to some other sketch tools we have more familiarity with. Silhouette Entities creates sketch geometry by projecting the outline of bodies […]
SOLIDWORKS just announced that SOLIDWORKS 2021 Beta is scheduled to go live near the end of June. Like previous years, SOLIDWORKS will have a Beta program allowing users to test the new software. What is the Beta Program? Participating in the in the Beta program is more than just taking the next release of SOLIDWORKS for a test drive. It’s about connecting with the BETA community, interacting with the SOLIDWORKS R&D team to provide your feedback on the new functionality […]
The 3DEXPERIENCE platform from Dassault Systemes is a solution that CATI customer Acer Technologies seemed to have sought after since their inception. “When I started about 11 years ago, I wanted Acer to be a virtual company. No server to host, no office, can work whenever, however, from anywhere. My mission statement was essentially to be an extension of a company’s engineering department.” says JP Judge, Owner of Acer Technologies. “3DEXPERIENCE has allowed us to be the virtual company we […]
With the arrival of SOLIDWORKS 2020 SP3, we have seen an increase of installations and questions come into Tech Support. Users are noticing a few subtle differences in the SOLIDWORKS user interface but DON’T WORRY, this is not like Icon color-gate from SW 2016! These changes are much easier to overlook. Vanishing Help Menu Let us start with the following screen of SOLIDWORKS 2020 SP3. Notice anything missing? The traditional Help menu is removed from the Menu Bar in service pack […]
SOLIDWORKS User Group Network: Virtual Meetings With all that is changing in our world like social distancing and most employees working from home or remote locations, SOLIDWORKS Community User Advocacy Group is hosting several virtual meetings for customers. These range from topics on certification tips to advanced topics on Simulation and Flow analysis. Some of the sessions repeat so you can hopefully attend the virtual sessions that fits your schedule. The next event is on April 7th and they’ll run […]
We’re sure many of you were excited to attend AMUG, Rapid, and various other industry trade shows this spring, and so were we. That is why starting on March 31st we’re presenting a web series called innovate3D: bring your ideas to life. We will be making all of our trade show presentations and demos, as well as some of our more popular 3DEXPERIENCE World presentations, available to you for free through this virtual series. You won’t even have to […]
Anyone who has attended SOLIDWORKS World in the past knows that one of the most exciting times for a SOLIDWORKS user is when they preview what will be coming in the next release of the software as well as announcing the results of the Top 10 Enhancements voting. This year at 3DExperience World 2020 in Nashville, TN they shared what’s new in 2021 a little differently. Rather than a main stage presentation, they did it in small “pop ups” where they […]
The new release of SOLIDWORKS 2020 is now available and the Computer Aided Technology Tech Team is excited for this release and all its new features. At the beginning of September, we started documenting the best new features of SOLIDWORKS 2020 from Part, Assembly, and Drawing tools to the new features in the SOLIDWORKS family of tools like Simulation, EPDM, SOLIDWORKS Electrical, and SOLIDWORKS CAM. We have been sharing them with you and the SOLIDWORKS community thru the CATI Blog. We have since published over 80 different […]
This new enhancement in SOLIDWORKS 2020 is super straightforward. Thicken (for a surface) and Thicken-Cut features can now be thickened in a direction other than normal to face. All of the following can be used to specify the direction: Sketched Line Pair of vertices Sketched Points Cylindrical Faces Reference Planes Conical Faces Reference Axis Points in Reference Geometry Linear Model Edges Planar Faces I hope this part of the What’s New series gives you a better understanding of the new […]