SOLIDWORKS 2021 Change Mate Alignments on Edit

SOLIDWORKS 2021 introduces greater automatic control over what happens when flipping a mate alignments would result in errors.

Prior to 2021, there is a checkbox for either prompting for confirmation or not.

Pre-SOLIDWORKS 2021 settings option

In SOLIDWORKS 2021, the Change Mate Alignments on Edit control is replaced by a dropdown:

SOLIDWORKS 2021 settings option

The functionality is triggered by right-clicking the mate in the feature tree, and choosing Flip Mate Alignment.  Depending on the setting, the next action is as follows:

• Always will flip the existing mate and reorient the component accordingly.  This may cause the reaction of SOLIDWORKS reversing the alignment of other components in order to prevent mate errors, but otherwise errors may occur.
• Prompt will prompt the user what to do.
• If errors would result from the flip, then Never will flip the alignment setting of the mate and trigger any errors that result, without actually forcing the component to reorient.  This can be useful if the intent is to protect the assembly from “blowing up” right away.  It also gives the user a chance avoid errors by undoing that action.

NOTE that flipping the mate alignment, while editing the mate in the mate property manager, will bypass this new functionality.

Get SOLIDWORKS Training

Learn more assembly tips in tricks in our SOLIDWORKS Assembly Modeling course, and familiarize with the latest enhancements in our SOLIDWORKS Advanced Update course!