Jon Hirschtick and the movie 21

I didn’t realize what I was hearing when I witnessed Vic Leventhal’s presentation at the Tri-Valley SolidWorks User Group (T-VSWUG) kick-off meeting.  He made a comment about Jon Hirschtick (co-founder of SolidWorks) and the movie 21 almost in passing.

I made my own little presentation at this new SWUG to support the new group at its kick-off meeting.  I have my own article about the meeting.  Gabi Jack (another Blog Squad member) happened to record Vic Leventhal’s presentation.  This single act has turned out to be at the center of recent buzz in the SolidWorks community about the new movie 21.  Vic Leventhal mentions that Jon Hirschtick was part of the MIT Blackjack team and that he used money earned from that effort to start SolidWorks.

I ask a question that has already been answered in a rather spectacular way.  “Was Jon Hirschtick, co-founder of SolidWorks, part of the former MIT Blackjack team that the movie 21 is about?”  Jason Raak at RockSolid Perspective asked this question in a recent article on his blog.  He mentioned how he studied Mrs. Jack’s video of Vic Leventhal’s speech.  He also linked to another source that made the connection in a news article.  And, he disclaimered his comments about the link between the movie and Mr. Hirschtick by saying he hadn’t heard from him about this matter.

Well, the very first comment to his article is Jon Hirschtick himself responding with an undeniable confirmation that he was indeed involved in the MIT Blackjack team!  Assuming this comment is actually from Jon Hirschtick, this is prolly the best comment that has ever been placed on any SolidWorks community blog.  If it wasn’t for that comment, I wouldn’t have even wrote this article.  I invite anyone who hasn’t seen the RockSolid Perspective article to go HERE now to check out Mr. Hirschtick’s comment.

Material Database help

I am trying to update my material database for all of you to use.
I have not had much time to look up material info and some special materials I’m having trouble looking them up, so I’m asking for help.
If you have a material that you would like me to add, please email me the info as needed in IPS (inch, pound, second) units. (It’s easier for me to add all of them per one unit)

The format I need is per the following example:

1. Classification – Aluminum alloys
2. Material name – Alum 2011
3. Texture – machined\brushed\cast\etc
4. Other texture/color info that is special.
Physical properties example
EX “Elastic modulus” value=70326525952.00000
NUXY “Poisson’s ratio” value=0.330000
ALPX “Thermal expansion coefficient” value=0.000023
DENS “Mass density” value=2823.349854
KX “Thermal conductivity” value=142.100006
C “Specific heat” value=962.780029
SIGXT “Tensile strength” value=379211648.00000
SIGYLD “Yield strength” value=296474560.00000

Attached is an example screen shot of what the material properties look like within SolidWorks.

SolidWorks Material example

Thank you.

Update Alert!  The new materials database is ready.  Please see this article for details and download: ctopher’s SolidWorks Material Database.

Your New 3D ContentCentral

3D ContentCentral (3DCC) has recently been overhauled and drastically expanded.  It is now organized into these tabs: Home, Parts, Features, Blocks, and Macros.  Each tab has a Top Rated area and a Recently Added area.  For parts, there is a section where you can make requests for new parts.  These requests can be filled by other members of the 3DCC.  There is even a contest for who can fulfill the most requests; it has some cool prizes each month.

Parts is divided similar to how it was before, but now it is visually organized for easier identification of each area.  Featured categories, suppliers and user libraries are still available.

The Features tab is divided in many useful categories, with weldments heavily represented.  There is plenty of opportunity for us to populate these areas.  That’s the nice way as saying that Feature categories are currently pretty bare of content.

Blocks is another area that boosts the opportunity for users to populate its categories.  Some categories have a good start, while others are very bare.  Surprising to me is the fact that electrical componentry is currently highly represented in this area.

Macros is being populated fairly quickly by users.  There is already a decent selection of macros to choose from in various categories, such as Add-ins, Assemblies, Drawings, etc.

3DCC now give users the ability to both rate contributions and to comment on them.  This will be useful to determine if a download is worth your time.

My only complaint about 3DCC at this time is that it takes too many steps to get to these areas from within SolidWorks (at least in SW 2007).  Click on Design Library, then 3D ContentCentral, then User Library, then the Home icon.

Have fun with the new layout and content.  I hope to see many new additions soon! 🙂

Set up of Custom Properties for Drawing Template Use

Custom properties can be deceptively simple in purpose.  They can be used for a wide variety of functions.  One of the most basic of these is quickly inserting values into drawing templates.  This allows the user to quickly fill in the title block and other areas of a drawing with no direct editing of the sheet format or even the sheet itself.

For those people not familiar with custom properties and how to use them on drawings, I wrote a previous article about how to link custom properties to annotation notes on drawings.  Also, see SolidWorks Help.  The remainder of this article will assume familiarity with this function.  In this article, I wish to discuss the issue of when to use particular sources for the custom properties for the purpose of filling out a title block and other drawing areas.  I do not present my article as a final word on the issue.  In fact, I hope to create dialogue on this issue in the comments of this article.  So first, let me ask some questions.

Should one maintain the values for custom properties on the drawing itself?  Should one maintain the values on the solid model, and refer to those in the drawing?  Or, should one maintain some values on the drawing and some from the model?  If there is a mixed answer, which properties come from where?  Here’s what I’ve found.  (There is no absolute answer for every situation.)

The solid model is increasing become more important.  The drawing is the source for far less information in the 3D CAD realm.  Given this fact, utilizing the solid model’s meta-information at must as possible can prove to be very advantageous.  Custom properties are no exception to this.  Values for custom properties can be established on the solid model and utilized directly on the drawing.  This is very powerful because it allows the user to enter certain data only once in the model and have it applied parametrically to the drawing.  When the model changes, so does the drawing.

However, not all custom properties will have the same value in the model and the drawing.  For example, the originator and origination date may be different between the solid model and drawing.  There’s also the issue of multiple parts on a drawing (where drawing information isn’t necessarily driven by one or the other or either).   Imagine the use of workarounds to avoid being forced to directly edit the sheet format to account for these scenarios.

Other issues may arise.  Engineers may not set up models correctly in the first place; with all the required information properly filled out.  Many engineers tend to create their own part/assembly templates that may not interface with the standard drawing template properly.  Models or drawings may be from outside sources that have different schemes. 

In some environments, drawings tend to have more properties than the model due to notation standards.  Examples of this can be values for the watermark or inspection criteria.  I looked into this recently at my own company and I found that only 2 of the basic 7 properties are 100% common between the model and drawing.  I don’t want to create confusion as to where to fill out which properties.  I also don’t want people editing the sheet format because values from the model is different than the drawing; or still further to have some drawings work differently than other drawings because the method to obtain values was changed via the Properties dialog box.  So I left the custom properties as a function of the drawing and not the model (the model carries its own information that pertains to it).  Does one really want to have to open the model every time a text only spec is changed on the drawing?  Additionally, it is not necessary that a drawing have a model or assembly associated with it at all.  Where would the values for the drawing come from in that event? 

There are a lot of rules that must be in place in order for a clean use of solid model properties directly on the drawing.  Some people call these good practices.  I just call them rules because at the end of the day it’s 6 one way and 1/2 a dozen another.  For me, it’s just a matter of having flexibility on how drawings are created and used.

Bottom line, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution in the case of linking to custom properties from the solid model verses maintaining them on the drawing.  When setting up a system, it is best to determine what is most beneficial for that particular system.  I suspect in most cases, there will be a mix between which custom properties on drawings are linked to the solid model, and which are controlled on the drawing itself.

Some macros that allow copying of properties between files:  Rigid Custom Properties, Migrate Properties, and FixProperties.  Websites to explore for more of these types of macros are Lenny’s SolidWorks Resources, Lorono’s SolidWorks Resources, and Esox Republic.

Super Geek (republished)

This is a classic tale of super geekdom.  I originally had this story on my person blog in April of 2007, but felt it SolidWorks Legion is more appropriate.  (I don’t/won’t republish blog entries often.)  Here’s the tale.

I recently went to a users group meeting for SolidWorks. SolidWorks is a 3D modelling program that engineers use to create components on the computer to have them made in real life. The fact that I feel I have to explain this may suggest that perhaps this is a geek topic. Well, in the wrong context, this can be a bit of an embarrassment to some. ::Queue wrong context [music]:: (-:

At this meeting, for some reason they had these car large magnets that said something like “I design with SolidWorks”. Not exactly the coolest statement around. Most everyone at the meeting was like scratching their head as to why SolidWorks would make these things. But, of course, I immediately realized their value. I picked one up.

I waited for the ideal opportunity to put this magnet squarely on the passenger side door of my coworker’s 1989 Nissan Z. This opportunity came on Tuesday (a couple weeks ago [March/April 2007]). So on that Friday morning, [my co-worker] Elvis comes in to work and precedes to tell me how he has been rolling all around town the day before, only to discover to his horror this magnet on the side of his car. He even explained to me why he didn’t notice it right away (cuz he doesn’t see the passenger side of his car very often). The only reason he found it is because he happened to need to get something from the right side of his car that night (Thursday). He was telling me this first because he knew the thoughtful gift was from me.

Of course, being the good friend I am, I made sure he knew just how long it had been on his car, since that Tuesday lunch time. He was all, “Oh man! You mean I went all over town with this super geeky thing on my car? I went [to the local college] for an evening class, rolling around pimpin’ in the parking lot, laid back with my arm up on the wheel [straight armed].” Elvis takes classes at the local college in order to meet girls. So, all the while he was rolling around with confidence, he had this super geeky magnet on the side of his car, proudly displaying his inner geek for all to see.

My only regret is that I didn’t pick up more of these magnets to plaster all over the passenger side of the car to amp up the humiliation, NASCAR style.

Introduction to SolidWorks Custom Properties

SolidWorks has something called custom properties. Many programs within Windows have file formats that include properties which allow the user to include some general information about the file without affecting its actual content. For most of these programs, there is a standard short list that includes fields like Author, Keywords, Comments, Title, and Subject. There is also a method that allows the user to create their own custom properties.

SolidWorks has simplified the process to create custom properties, and allows its users to utilize their values within the document via linked annotation notes. The custom properties are available under pulldown File>Properties>Custom tab. There are even shortcuts included that allows the user to create links in these fields to attributes of the document itself.

The advantage in using custom properties is that one can link to their values in annotation notes. This allows for automatic updates to annotation notes without having to edit them directly.

Here are the instructions to link a note to a property. (These instructions are from SolidWorks Help which can be found by searching titles only for “Link to Property”. For more detailed information, please see the Help.)

Start an annotation note.

In the Note PropertyManager (left pane) choose this icon:

 Link to Property Icon

-OR-

In the Note Properties dialog box, choose this icon:

Link to Property Icon

Then,

  1. Select the radial button that identifies the file from where the values will be linked.  The most common choices are either the “Current Document” or “Model in view specified in the sheet properties” (for drawings).
  2. View the available custom properties.

    Dialog

  3. Choose one and then click the OK button.
  4. This will add a tag to your annotation note that looks something like $PRP:”<property name>”.  The annotation note itself will display the value of that custom property.

This can be used to automatically fill in data fields on drawing blocks based on custom properties and document properties in the model.  It can also allow the fields to be filled in from a macro that is designed to provide those values.  Linking annotation notes to custom properties can save a lot of time and reduce repeatitive drawing activies.  However, before committing completely to using links to custom properties on drawings, one should look into the methods and reasons for this.  They should also consider the pros and cons of each.  I will go into detail about when and how to use links to custom properties on drawings in a near future article.