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There’s just over a week until the CADDedge Concept2Design SolidWorks training event at Foxwoods, Connecticut.

Chris and Gemma from the DriveWorks Sales and Marketing team will be there for both days of the event.

Pop over to the DriveWorks booth and say hello!

If you haven’t registered yet, there’s still time. CADDEdge have provided a handy justification to help you convince your boss!

Xp Sinking

When Windows XP first launched in 2001, 12 years ago, the DriveWorks journey was just beginning. Since then DriveWorks, and the world of computing, has come a long way.

In 2001, the recommended requirements for running Windows XP were a measly 300 MHz processor and 128mb of ram. Today, mostphoneshave specifications that can easily outpace these specifications. DriveWorks is now on version 10, having added 3D previews, custom form designer and online integration along the way.Despite the release of 5 versions of Windows since 2001, Windows XP still remains the second most used operating system globally.

In April this year, Windows will officially stop supporting the Windows XP platform, even for critical security issues.

For anyone still running Windows XP, here are a few reasons why it really is nowtime to upgrade.

Security

As mentioned above, support for XP will end in April. This should be particularly worrying given that in December 2013 alone, three “critical” security flaws, which allowed attackers to remotely run malicious software on the machines,were patched in XP. From April Microsoft will no longer do this.

Some companies will no doubt attempt to paper over the cracks by disconnecting those machines that are running XP from the external network, this still however leaves these machines vulnerable to viruses that are found in the company intranet or even on a USB Stick.

What this all means, is that after April, any web connected Windows XP machine is like an open door, ready to warmly welcome any malicious code.

Data Protection

Related to the first point, decreased security makes data increasingly vulnerable. This poses a problem for businesses financially (as important customer data can be stolen) and also legally, as sensitive data must be protected by law. Simply put, any data that is stolen from your network comes under your legal jurisdiction and must be protected as such.

Latest Technology

Perhaps the most important reason for any business to upgrade their machines besides security, are the latest features that are found on newer versions of Windows and other programs too such as SolidWorks and DriveWorks. These new versions not only run at higher speeds, they also offer more functionalityand improvedusability.

For example the inbuilt support for 3D printing found in Windows 8.1 might be attractive to some companies and its worth noting that only Windows 7 and above can run the latest versions of SolidWorks and DriveWorks.

Speed and Reliability

Windows 8, Microsofts latest offering, not only offers a graphical overhaul, but also gives users a faster smoother and more reliable operating system. While it might seem that a smooth operating system is not a necessity, the improved productivity afforded by a fully functional operating system is surely worth the investment.

Conclusion: Increase Productivity and Stay Safe

Installing a new version of Windows across your business might seem like a daunting and costly task, but the time lost in the installation process will be made back ten times over with the security, usability and speed increases afforded to you by new versions of Windows, SolidWorks and DriveWorks.

So dont hold back, take the plunge.

You wont regret it.

Here at DriveWorks we cant get enough of 3D printing.

Anything that can turn your meticulously made models in to a real 3D product without great big machines is certainly cool in our book. We love the idea that it is possible to use DriveWorks to automate the design of new parts printed by a 3D printer.

It seems though, that 3D printing may not be just for prototypes.

A Wohler Associates Report has recently shown that 28.3% of all printed 3D parts are made for producing final products not for prototyping. This signals a growth of almost 25% in only 10 years. Although often known as rapid prototyping, the market seems to be expanding for 3D printing as a manufacturing tool.

Wohlers Report Final Part Growth

As with any piece of new technology, the wider the spread of the technology the cheaper its price will be. Which is perhaps why, as well as a growth in commercial production of 3D printed parts, there is also a move towards cheaper home printing.

Gartner are predicting that by 2016 we will see Enterprise-Class 3D printers available for under $2000 (贈1300). This price brings 3D printing in to an affordable price range.

Most excitingly, the lowered price will see a greater adoption rate by the general public, hopefully further expanding the uses that we might see.

Have you seen any great 3D printed designs? If so dont be afraid to leave your comments below.

DriveWorksXpressis thefree Design Automation tool included with every seat of SOLIDWORKSandis a great way tosave a littletime every day.

  • Automate repetitive design tasks.
  • Re-use existing designs.
  • Generate new SOLIDWORKS parts and assemblies quickly and easily.

You might be thinking that while this all sounds great, you have been using design tables in SOLIDWORKS to save some time already.

Well, here are 5 reasons for choosing DriveWorksXpress over design tables:

  1. File Size – DriveWorksXpress creates new files, which keeps file size to a minimum.
  2. Ease of Use – Control Assemblies, sub assemblies and parts from one user interface without the need to open up each one to update its design table.
  3. Scalability & Share with Others – DriveWorksXpress allow colleagues with SOLIDWORKS to create Parts, Assemblies and Drawings too by filling out a simple form. Others do not need to know how you set it up, or which Assemblies and/or parts to open up and modify to get the desired results
  4. Automated Drawings – Update drawings for parts and assemblies quickly and easily.
  5. Rules Driven –Use Rules to determine which calculation or value is required to drive a given parameter. Rules and calculations that affect multiple parts and assemblies are easily linked in the DriveWorksXpress rule editor

The best part is that if you already have SOLIDWORKS, then you already have DriveWorksXpress!

You can find DriveWorksXpress inside SOLIDWORKS here:

Check out the DriveWorksXpress YouTube channel for How to Video Clips and you’ll soon be saving time!

For more information visitwww.driveworks.co.uk or contact your local SOLIDWORKS Reseller.

One
of our resellers’ 3D vision has sent us a fantastic customer success story,
once again showing us how DriveWorks can be used to streamline your business,
through saving time and freeing up your creative juices for innovation.

Custom
coach manufacturer Farber create speciality vehicles for a wide range of clients
in industries such as Home Land Security, Dental, Medical and communications.

With such
a varied portfolio of customers comes the challenge of creating custom designs
for each one, in the past this would mean expensive and time consuming
redesigns for each new vehicle.

Farber Speciality Vehicles began their experience with DriveWorks like many of our customers do, by tryingDriveWorks Solo in a 30 day trial. After seeing what DriveWorks Solo could do for their business they decided it was time to upgrade to DriveWorks Pro and expand their capabilities.

Now, using DriveWorks Pro, SolidWorks Models are produced in the
background permitting the engineers to spend more time working on other
elements of design.

Farber
Speciality Vehicles have automated the design of custom cabinetry for all their
vehicles, which means they can quickly create high quality custom designs that
meet the specifications of their customer.

To
find out more about Farber Speciality Vehiclesclick here.

3DVisioncoverOhio, Kentucky and Indiana.


Try
DriveWorks Solo for free athttp://bit.ly/15l2nhP

 


3DVision DriveWorks Case Study_Farber Specialty Vehicles

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ThisDriveWorks Liveproject shows the different ways of configuring 3D on the web using DriveWorks.

DriveWorks has its own 3D file format, which is an export from SolidWorks. Slide4

Once exported DriveWorks 3D Workshop can be used to prepare the model for configuration on the web. DriveWorks 3D Workshop is free and included with DriveWorks Pro.

DriveWorks 3D Files have been created to work in most modern browsers and on most devices. In this walkthrough example, the user can see how easy it is to manipulate DriveWorks 3D files to be able to see various views and zoom in and out.

Slide5The example includes information text, explaining how the project is working. Using DriveWorks rules technology the user can choose whether or not this information is displayed. The demo illustrates that appearances can be changed without having to create thousands of exported models. It also demonstrates how DriveWorks can even create and view 3D models that have not been created before.Slide3

For this, SolidWorks is running in the background. If the file does not exist, DriveWorks Autopilot will create it and export the DriveWorks 3D file, before previewing it in the browser.

So head on over to the DriveWorks Live demo site now to see different ways to create and manipulate 3D on the web and on your device.

 

This demo is great for Business to Consumer (B2C) companies – that make products that would go straight to the consumer. It presents how they can create a form that customers can work through themselves, configuring their ideal design of the item (in this case a sofa). The company will then be sent the various documents needed – such as Bill of Materials and Drawings. Once the project has been set up, an engineer/designer does not even have to be involved in this part of the design process, excellent for freeing up time to spend on completely bespoke projects.

This particular demo is very visual and uses as little text as possible – fantastic for international companies, as it limits any difficulty with a language barrier. Items can be easily configured, just
through the power of the images.

So, I went through this project from a consumer point of view – interested in creating my own perfect chair design, which is made completely to my taste. I do not come from a technical background, so me running through this demo is incredibly realistic, to show that any person – technical or not – can configure their own creation within minutes. These are the steps I took:

1. Visit www.driveworkslive.com demo site.

2. Click on the Shopping Cart square (with the trolley icon).

3. Click on ‘Hello.’

 

4. Then choose the item to configure – in this case a chair.

5. Click on the image, or the text Design your NewSofa.

6. Choose the size of the seating you require.

7. Configure the colour, shape and feet of your chair.

 

8. Click add to basket.

9. Click on ‘go to checkout’ – here you can choose extras also.

10. Click on ‘continue to checkout’ and enter your details. Then submit.

So, in just 10 quick steps I managed to create my perfect chair, I was then emailed all the sales and manufacturing documents. In theory, manufacturing could now begin. (If I had a spare 贈500).

Head on over to www.driveworkslive.com and configure yourself your very own perfect sofa.

The team have returned from the snowy land of Chicago after a really successful DriveWorks World 2013 last week. There was a fantastic turn out, with DriveWorks customers, resellers and partners completing DriveWorks Solo / DriveWorks Pro training andcertifications on DriveWorks 10 AND of courselearning all about ‘What’s New in DriveWorks 10’.

The event took place from Monday 4th – Friday 8th March at the Marriott Chicago O’Hare Hotel. Although there was a day of heavy snow, it was cleared speedily and efficiently in true Chicago style with no disruption to the training.

Our sponsors all really helped make the event such a success, donating: money, time, laptops and storage space – so we really want to thank SolidWorks, Graphics Systems, CATI and Razorleaf for all their support.

It’s great that so many people received their DriveWorks certifications – becoming Certified DriveWorks Professionals and Certified DriveWorks Applications Engineers.

Thursday evening was time for the DriveWorks World 2013 Awards Dinner.

Although everyone had chance to network throughout the week, we thought this would be the perfect opportunity for everyone to relax and celebrate a fantastic
week of hard work.

The following people won awards (and will be receiving a DriveWorks World 2013 polo shirt shortly):

One really memorable moment for all of us was when Shaji Shereef of www.fgwa.com presented the DriveWorksTechnical Team witha special customer serviceaward.The coinis generally only given out internally within the Barry Wehmiller Group, so it was really special that they presented it to us! Thank you!

We really want to say a massive thank you to everyone who attended for making the event as great as it was. It was really valuable for us to see how you are using the software, and great to hear how it is helping you. We’ve only been back in the office a few hours, and already have some really positive feedback about the event:

Thank you very much for putting on such a great event in Chicago. Everything was terrific; the venue, the training, the networking and the dinner. It is exciting for me to not only watch your company grow, but how your team helps other companies thrive.” – Tony Lambert (Van Aire)

Now it’s time to get planning for DriveWorks World 2014!

4th-8th March 2013

DriveWorks World will be held at the Marriott Chicago OHare hotel, just a short shuttle ride from Chicago OHare InternationalAirport. It will introduce you to the latest DriveWorks software release – DriveWorks 10 and include instructor-led training sessions on DriveWorks Soloand DriveWorks Pro.

All delegates will have the opportunity to attain their DriveWorks
Certifications.

In the past we have held DriveWorks World immediately after SolidWorks World. Enthusiastic feedback from past attendees and also from those who wanted to attend but who could not, has resulted in us opting to put on a separate event in a central US location with more sessions covering a wider range of topics and which match the different abilities and needs of our
growing DriveWorks User community.

Whether you are just getting started using DriveWorks or you have advanced knowledge of the software, there will be sessions of value and interest to you.

Reasons to attend

DriveWorks World is for all DriveWorks Value Added Resellers and Customers with a valid Subscription Support contract. For more information, just log into:

The DriveWorks Reseller Community

The DriveWorks User Community

Check out these posts to see the great feedback from our last training and certification event held in June: DriveWorks World 2012

 

Why doesn’t DriveWorks create new configurations in your SolidWorks master model?

DriveWorks creates brand new copies of your master files andall changes are made to these files, but why do things this way? The reasons are outlined below:

 

Issue 1

By adding configurations to your SolidWorks master model you are increasing the data stored within the file, resulting in the master assembly file getting VERY BIG, VERY QUICKLY! If you ever needed to send this to anyone, the massive file would be difficult to move around.

DriveWorks Solution 1

DriveWorks takes a copy of your master models, the file size does not increase. As DriveWorks takes a copy of the files and works on those, the files can be easily transferred from machine to machine without having to worry about anyone else having a copy of your master data.

Issue 2

If you are working with your SolidWorks master models and all your automated design configurations are kept within one file – if anything happens to this file (e.g. it gets deleted or becomes corrupt during the creation of a new configuration) all yourmaster model data could be lost.

DriveWorks Solution 2

DriveWorks does not do anything to your master models, other than take a copy of the files. This ensures you will never run the risk of corrupting or losing all of your master model data when creating new configurations.

Issue 3

Using configurations also limits the interaction you have with drawings.

DriveWorks Solution 3

As DriveWorks creates brand new files, it also can create brand new drawings that reference these new files, this ensures the correct models appear on the drawing. DriveWorks also gives you the tools and ability to have a high level of control of the final drawing sheet, by controlling elements such as: the scale of the drawing views, any annotations that appear on the drawing and also custom properties in the drawing.

 

Specification flow is apowerful feature in DriveWorksthat givesthe DriveWorks Administrator the ability to customize the DriveWorks specification process. (ie rules for what happens and when it happens).

When aproject is first set up in DriveWorks it is created with a default specification flow which guides a specification through four basic states – Running (i.e. filling out forms in the specification), Saved, Pending, and Completed.

Each one of these states has links toother states to move from one state to another. For example, a specification in the Saved state can be moved into the Running state, and a specification in the Running state can be moved into the Pending state (by clicking Finish), or the Completed state (by clicking Release). These links between states are called transitions.

Each state also has certain operations that can be performed on it, but which do not move to another state, for example, a specification can be deleted, or copied.

The Specification Flow can be customized in DriveWorks Administrator to meet your own specification and Work flow needs.

Example Uses
There are lots of reasons why you may want to look at customizing your specification flow, here are a few examples.

You can read more about Specification Flow in the ONLINEdocumentation file
http://docs.driveworkspro.com/?ProjectEditorSpecificationFlow.html

 

 

 

File naming is an important consideration when planning an automation project and DriveWorks provides flexibility in how files are named.

Thisarticle describes how filesare named in DriveWorks, and how the names you choose interact with the concept of alternatives and driven alternatives so that you can build up libraries of parts that can be used again and again without needing to be generated for each specification that is generated.

The following key concepts are described in this document:

Simple File Names (Suffixed)
DriveWorks decides file names for models in a very simple way, for example, if we have the following assembly structure and file name rules:

Then DriveWorks will generate a new assembly and parts for a specification numbered 8 as follows:

Here you can see that DriveWorks has simply suffixed the original component names, with a space, and the result of the file name rule (in this case 8).

Absolute File Names
It is also possible to tell DriveWorks not to use the original file name at all, for example:

Would create the following for a specification numbered 8:

Prefixed File Names
The other possibility is to tell DriveWorks to use the result of the rule as a prefix, for example:

Would create the following for a specification numbered 8:

This article is just one of many online providing useful information on using DriveWorks Pro

46,000 visitors PLUS, that is the number of people that visited the Show! That is ALOT of people and with all the halls at the massive Anaheim Convention Centre full to bursting it meant there were ALOT of exhibitors too… and that included DriveWorks!

Time to investin cushion-soled ‘show’shoes I think!

Thanks go toDriveWorks resellers Hawk Ridge and Go Engineer for their support over the 3 days at the Show.

Saving Time and Money through Design Automationwas the subject of the presentation at SolidWorks World 2009 by Trevor Waldeland and Eric Summerfield of Exlar

The customer has the option to put any motor on this product line.

Because of this, there is a list of things that can vary with the motor plate. (shown in Orange)

Motor1 Motor2

There are 2 steps to using Design Automation with DriveWorksXpress.

  1. Setting Up your project
  2. Running your project

So once you have decided what things can change, youidentify and capturethose thingsfrom your SolidWorks Model, make sure you have a drawing, create a formand build your rules.

Once that is done you simply fill out your form with the specification for your new variation.

ExlarForm

Your new partwill now have all the new dimensions we entered.
You can now create any new parts in the future in about 1 minute usingthe project you have set up in DriveWorksXpress

Exlar drawing

1. How long did it take to create variations before DriveWorksXpress?
30 minutes to 1 hour

2. How long did it take to set this project up in DriveWorksXpress?
2 hours

3. How long does it take now to create a new variation using DriveWorksXpress?
5 minutes

4. How many possible variations could there be?
Unlimited

5. How would you describe your experience of using DriveWorksXpress?
Really easy to setup and use. We are in the process right now of installing
the full version of DriveWorks because of the easy of use and time savings.

6. Have you shared your work with your colleagues?
Yes, all of our SolidWorks users has access to these files.

7. Will you be adding more products and rules?
Absolutely!!

 

On theDriveWorksXpress site we have an area where people can tell us how they have got on using DriveWorksXpress. They can upload picures of their products, screen grabs of their DriveWorksXpress form and aRules Summary. They can also tell us how long things used to take them before they had DriveWorksXpress and how long it takes them now. The feedback has been stunning.

One such company to told us what they have been doing is Mondragon Assembly. They design and manufacture systems and equipment for process automation. They are aglobal company, manufacturing in Europe and North America, andoffer highly custom solutions for assembly process automation requirements.

Oscar Jos辿 Hern叩ndez isthrilled withhis achievements in DriveWorksXpress…

Time spent setting up 6 weeks
“It took around six weeks, this includes learning how to use DriveWorksXpress, and whenever I discovered something new, I stepped back to make everything smoother and easier.”

Time spent before SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress 2 days
“It took approximately 2 days.”

Time taken with SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress 10 minutes
“It now takes around ten minutes or less.”

How would you describe your experience with using DriveWorksXpress?
“This tool is awesome, at first I thought we couldnt make a good use of it, but it has made our life much easier.”

Do you make use of the resources available at www.driveworksxpress.com?
“Of course, when I have a question I go to the DriveWorksXpress forum for some enlightenment and also when I was learning DriveWorksXpress I downloaded the exercises and videos.”

Have you shared your work with colleagues?
“Yes, the entire design department uses this.”

I’m going to keep reporting these results here on the blog because I think it’s worth sharing with everyone. with results like these it becomes easy to justify purchasing the full version of DriveWorks.