Mayday! – The Customer Sent a New STEP File in the 11th Hour

You spent a lot of time on this project. Everything started with a STEP file received from your customer, file that you imported in SolidWorks, repaired, cleaned up, added the required features (don’t they not know molded parts need draft?)… Now the feature tree is 3 feet long.

It is 4:30 pm on Friday and you are looking forward to your weekend. The deadline for your project is next Wednesday, but you are on track. You finished modeling all the parts, created the assemblies and their drawings including BOMs and balloons and are just putting the finishing touches on the last detail drawings.

A pop-up… “you got mail”. Maybe your boss is telling everybody to go home early…

No, no such luck! It is from your customer asking for a last minute design change. He says it is a “small change” but he sent you a new STEP file, because the shape of some surfaces has changed.

So what can you do now? Start everything from scratch?

Well… let me begin by telling you how lucky you are. You are lucky because I went last week to the Ontario SolidWorks User Group meeting, where Michael Fernando presented a lot of information about how to use imported parts and now I can share what I learnt with you.

For example, Michael showed us how to “re-read” the “Imported” feature in the tree. Just select it from the feature tree and click the “Edit Feature” icon (fig. 1).

Fig 1. - Edit the Imported Feature

You will have a nice surprise now. The “FILE/OPEN” dialog window will open and you will have the chance to reload the NEW neutral file. Of course, you might need to update some references, but at least your new model will be there and you preserved your whole feature tree.

No need for overtime Saturday and Sunday. Have a nice week-end! 🙂