Location:   HG Weber in Kiel, WI

Attendance:        Approximately 35 people from over 15 companies

Introductions:

Thanks was giving to all of the people who helped with the NEWSUG meeting – SolidWorks, Graphics Systems Corporation, Computer aided technologies, and Impact Engineering, MSC Technologies, and Custom Programming Unlimited.

Charter:

The charter for NEWSUG was distributed and was briefly discussed.  If anyone would like a copy of the charter please contact Mark Achtner at newsug@yahoo.com.  The board members for NEWSUG are Mark Kuckuk and Mark Achtner.  We encourage any members to be a board member or host a meeting.

Tour:

A tour of the HG Weber facilities was given.  Areas shown were the R & D Lab and the assembly area.  A machine, which was designed with SolidWorks, was demonstrated.

Break:

Food and refreshments were provided during the break.

Main Presentation:

Ed Gamoke and Mark Kuckuck gave the Main presentations.  Ed gave a presentation on the Best Practices Specific to H.G. Weber and Mark gave a presentation on Best Practices for Solidworks Parts and Assemblies.  The notes for the two presentations are attached to the minutes.

Break Out Session:

Two presentations were given at the end of the NEWSUG meeting, users had a choice of either presentation to attend.  One was presented by MSC Technologies on best practices.  The other was presented by Custom Programming on Simple PDM.
 
 

SolidWorks Best Practices Specific to H.G. Weber:

Purpose of Best Practices:  To get all users working off of the same SolidWorks settings.  Settings are customizable to your particular business.

Benefit:    Uniformity of models, drawings, assembly's.
 

Covered:  Start Parts  &  Library Features

Start Files:  (Now Templates)

Standard is to always use start part (or templates for SW2000) to get consistency.  Start Parts Files include:  Part, Assembly, A size, B size, C size and D size drawings.
All of these Start Part files are customizable to the way your business
wants to have them.

For (98): H.G. Weber set up shortcuts and placed them on the desktop for quick access.
For (Y2K): Templates are used, therefore files used were relocated and renamed as templates.

Benefit:  All users are starting from the same base file, which  includes the drawing border setup, title block, plane naming convention, etc.

Library Features:

Specific library features were created for H.G. Weber due to the fact that they were common features to be added to model.  They are:

Placing a keyway in the end of a shaft.
Placing a captured keyway on a shaft.
Placing a keyway in a bore.
Placing a hole in the side of a cylinder.
Placing a hole in a single piece split collar.

Above standards sections were created by Impact Engineering for H.G.  Weber.

Benefit:  Uniformity of feature creation. Increased speed of feature creation.
 
 

BEST PRACTICES PRESENTATION
(for parts used in machines)

General Rule: Maximize the use of default or reference entities consistently in all modes; sketches, parts, assemblies, drawings.

Results:  Obvious and intentional conveyance of expected construction simplicity to future users. Future user could be the original modeler.  Modeling practices other than standard emphasize a different intent by virtue of a differing construction.
 

Sketches

· Choose a sketch plane that will orient the part upright or how it may appear on the machine.
· For symmetrical parts, sketch a cross section of the part allowing for extruded (mid- plane) symmetry, not sketched symmetry.
 -Mid-plane extrusions are self-explanatory and obvious.
· Default datum planes are utilized as primary mating planes.
· Choose default datum planes for sketching over model faces when practical. (hole wizard, cimlogic)
· Use default datum planes for automatic relations, co-linear relations,
and dimension base lines.
 -Planes can be picked from the tree.
· Avoid combining two or more features in the same sketch.
 -Combined features share the same end condition.
 -Combined features cannot be hidden/suppressed separately.
 -Combined features cannot be named separately.
 

Models

· Build the model feature by feature
- Separate features can be reordered
- Separate features can be copied
- Separate features can be saved in a library
· Plan to use feature patterns in a logical way
 -Patterns are flexible for use in configurations
  - Editable one configuration to the next
   - Suppressible one configuration to the next
 -Configurations may be varied within patterns
· Rename features & Dimensions
· Force dimensions with equations

Assemblies

· Create reference planes to match machine specifications (frame spacing, etc)
· Mate the first static component to the assembly default planes with the default part planes.
· Mate dynamic components with main axis/axis coincidence or axis/plane coincidence
· Mate successive parts to their symmetrical partners and direct fits.
- Use primary default mating planes as planned in sketching and modeling
- Planes can be picked from the tree
- Mate groups remain clear, logical and easy to read
· Maintain consistency between mating pairs in the mating scheme, first to first, second to second, etc.
· Drag & drop successive components from the tree