Chapter 38: Using Plastic Features
IN THIS CHAPTER
Exploring plastic features
Learning about plastic evaluation tools
SolidWorks has several tools that are specific to modeling and evaluating plastic parts. These tools can help simplify and standardize some of the complex repetitive tasks involved with plastic part design.
You can manually do all the work that these tools automate, which is useful when the automated tools don't provide the necessary options or flexibility. The more complex your models, the more comfortable you need to be with workaround techniques.
Because of the specific needs of plastic part modelers in some cases to prepare plastic parts for various molding methods, SolidWorks also has a set of powerful evaluation tools that help you examine your models to check the amount of draft, thickness, and location of undercuts. Finding design-related manufacturability problems in manufacturing is expensive. Finding them in the design office is far less expensive and conserves time. A good grasp of the evaluation tools is an important component of good plastic part and mold modeling practice.
This chapter is written for the user who's already experienced in plastics practice and terminology, but needs to understand the SolidWorks tools used with the plastic and mold features. In this chapter, I assume that you already have a grasp of basic plastics and mold design and terminology.
Using Plastic Features
The plastic features available in SolidWorks are the Mounting ...
