Javelin / TriMech Author
Chris Briand, CSWE
Are you at Risk for SOLIDWORKS Disc’s Disease During Upgrade Season?
By Chris Briand, CSWE on April 12, 2017
Are you, or your Team at High Risk During SOLIDWORKS Upgrade Season? Now that I have your attention, let us stop here and define what affliction we are speaking of: To answer your very first question, no this article is not about a degenerative spinal disorder…
How to replace SOLIDWORKS Sub-assemblies with Multi-Body Parts while maintaining Drawing References!
By Chris Briand, CSWE on December 20, 2016
As design evolves within SOLIDWORKS we find many customers have a desire to swap sub-assemblies for multi-body components. We could spend some time in this article to discuss why I think this may not be the best idea in regard to overall SOLIDWORKS performance, however…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 Uninstall will complete even when DLL files cannot be unregistered
By Chris Briand, CSWE on December 19, 2016
This little bit of functionality does not seem to be something that most folks would be interested in at all, until this SOLIDWORKS 2017 Uninstall message appears: Prior releases of SOLIDWORKS would ask you to pick up the saved log files and forward them along to…
Edit all of your File Locations Options at once in SOLIDWORKS 2017
By Chris Briand, CSWE on December 7, 2016
When I think I have found what is to be my favorite feature within SOLIDWORKS 2017, along comes something better. The new SOLIDWORKS File Location option reviewed in this article promises to be one of those “better” somethings… SOLIDWORKS File Location View/Edit Technique Here at…
Using the ALT Key while Routing in SOLIDWORKS 2017 will speed up your workflow
By Chris Briand, CSWE on December 6, 2016
The ALT key has been a staple of SOLIDWORKS functionality for a very long time now. It is one of our primary modifiers to intact various functionality, or cancel automated functionality. The ability to cancel functionality has been extended into the SOLIDWORKS 2017 Routing Add-in!…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 Change Multiple Sheet Formats at Once!
By Chris Briand, CSWE on December 1, 2016
Changing the sheet format of any SOLIDWORKS drawing can be an unwanted task, especially if one has multiple sheets upon which to swap the format. SOLIDWORKS 2017 has new functionality that swoops in for the assist. A new “Select Sheets to Modify” button now appears within…
Reduce SOLIDWORKS assembly open times by specifying external reference search locations
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 30, 2016
If there is one topic that repeatedly sends our customers to sleep, it’s file references. But what if I could tell you that could save time whenever you open an assembly? Where is this magic time saving switch you ask? It is squarely located within…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 Mate Controller now supports Path Mates
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 29, 2016
If you are a newcomer to the Mate Controller functionality within SOLIDWORKS, then check out the video below to learn how it works: For SOLIDWORKS 2017 a number of new features have been added to the Mate Controller which make its operation easier than ever before. Among…
Lock Column Width & Row Height formatting in SOLIDWORKS BOM Templates
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 25, 2016
BOM Tables in SOLIDWORKS can sometimes create as many issues as they often solve, as you take the time to manipulate the shape of your table against a given drawing template. After all of the manipulation via dragging columns and rows to a perfect height,…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 Add Configurations from within the Mate Controller
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 20, 2016
The Mate Controller had been a handy tool in past releases that could be used to review the positions of an assembly when attempting to drive multiple mates at one time. SOLIDWORKS 2017 provides us an additional outlet to explore our designs as we can take…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 brings relief to your sheet metal three bend corners
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 20, 2016
One of the common flange challenges that a sheet metal designer bumps into is the need to add a corner relief in their designs. In many cases this is where two bends come together, in other cases it is where three similar bends come together…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 allows you to create an Exploded View of a Routed Assembly
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 14, 2016
In previous releases of SOLIDWORKS we bore witness to many interesting behaviors when attempting to create an exploded view of a routed assembly. This has been corrected in SOLIDWORKS 2017. After a test drive of the expanded functionality, we are pleased to report that exploded…
SOLIDWORKS 2017 Offers Enhanced Drawing Performance in several areas
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 12, 2016
One of the areas in SOLIDWORKS that everyone likes to see improve is drawing performance. With SOLIDWORKS 2017 three areas of overall drawing performance were addressed: Optimization of Center Mark auto-insertion while creating a drawing view Lightweight Drawing Opening Time has been improved An option…
Be careful using SOLIDWORKS Convert to Bodies on models with referenced drawings
By Chris Briand, CSWE on November 7, 2016
In an earlier article, I introduced the New Convert to Bodies functionality available in SOLIDWORKS 2017. If you are considering the use of the “Convert to Bodies” functionality be cautious of models that have drawings referenced to them. Below are the details that are worth…
SOLIDWORKS Pipe Nipples that is! This is a safe for work blog after all. Another requested feature among those folks who use the Pipe & Tube Routing functionality within SOLIDWORKS has been the inclusion of Pipe Nipples in order to connect two fittings within a route…