Still far away to use the raw material of the 21st century – the bits, a single man had an idea that was subjected to the desire to achieve what we call today the beginning of the simulation. A new era of engineering and testing was born. A world that in our days exists mainly in digital forms, and where engineers faced with challenges before to build the physical product.

With limited resources, an inventor called Ed Link building in 1927 the first training device called the “Pilot Maker” for teaching the pilots how to fly.

All we know today about simulation started once with the “Pilot Maker” project, and since then everything has been moved from physical to digital era.

Such as Ed Link who changes forever the way that we learn and build products, SolidWorks is one of the tools that change the face of modeling and simulation.

By analyzing the features of SolidWorks, it is very easy to realize what powerful tool has the engineers in hands to start an accurate simulation of the behavior of robots.

Designed to run under the Windows OS and developed by Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corp., SolidWorks was subjected over time to several changes that made from this software a quick and effective tool for simulation.

Compared with other software from its area, the SolidWorks is quite intuitive and easy to learn. If you already know other more complex programs, this could be easily assimilated. This is one of the reasons that the simulation tool is very popular in industry.

With an impressive amount of improvements, the SolidWorks 2014 was already released. All these enhancements came from the user community and are expected to increase the efficiency and make the job easier.

The last version of the software wasn’t able to revolutionize how people interact with SolidWorks, but it makes big steps in increasing the efficiency and productivity. From the improvements list, many of these are focused on improving customer service and to satisfy more needs also for the customers.

Few of these improvements are here:

• advanced shape control;
• sketch enhancements;
• enhanced assembly performance and visualization;
• design communication and collaboration;
• new sheet metal features;
• streamlined simulation setup;
• faster drawing detailing;
• SolidWorks electrical improved integration and performance;
• SolidWorks enterprise PDM streamlined workflow;
• streamlined cost estimating and reporting;

In most cases you can learn the application from the built-in tutorials, which I have to recognize that are great, or to use a free e-book with most important features covered.

But there is a trick in designing that can make the difference between a poor design and a remarkable design: sketches on paper. Before designing something in SolidWorks, it could be useful to start having few sketches on a napkin, or a piece of paper, or anything else.

Digging more and more inside the tool, one differentiator mechanism in CAD design is the geometry kernel. This mechanism is closely linked with GUI, programming, API customization, constraint manager, and for SolidWorks all of these operate at maximum speed.

SolidWorks is a CAD software able to export CAD files to other software. If you want to learn and use the SolidWorks in the 3D printing process, you can use this to turn the 3D digital model in .STL file. Almost all 3D printers are compatible with .STL files extension.

Why SolidWorks?
In an ideal situation, the behavior of product designed digitally is similar with the product prototype. Such performance can be reached only with a set of powerful engineering and analyzing tools, which fortunately are available in SolidWorks.

SolidWorks is used by many engineers because:

• it is flexible;
• it has intuitive 3D design;
• costs less to manufacture;
• reduce changes of downstream errors;
• require less maintenance;
• connect and share your work with a large community of users;
• test and analyze in real world conditions;

Why to use SolidWorks in robotics?
Equipped with a magic stick, the SolidWorks is a very good 3D modeling tool to create prismatic parts and assemblies. At its core, it is a CAD software with abilities to transform what you want in a digital design that mimics the behavior of the product.

SolidWorks is very useful in robotics due to a long list of benefits including here the parametric design, increase productivity through its tools, reduce time and money for prototyping products, you can validate the design and make easy changes, it has support for materials included in the assembly such as sheet metal, routing piping, tubing, electric, etc., and it is a complete solution for design, validation, simulation and rendering.

Software engineers that develop the SolidWorks has a great idea to make this tool compatible with other CAD software (such as AutoCAD) including over 20 built-in file translators, and this is a great opportunity start working with SW and continue with other tools if the features of the tool cannot cover the requirements.

Covering the 2D geometry, a 2D design can be easily transformed into a 3D design.

Even if not all industries prefer to use SW including here automotive and aerospace industries, Catia is a comparable tool with great features for extremely large assemblies. There is a special relation between Catia and SW, and this can be seen predominantly in the .dll files. Some of the CATIA libraries are used in SolidWorks.

On the flip side SolidWorks is easier to learn compared with Catia, and also has a lower price than Catia, which is a good reason to be chosen in educational or industrial application if there do not exist any specific pressure for CAD package.

Wide ranges of resources are available for robotics students including 3D parts and assemblies, tools, curriculum, a free library, 2D blocks, and more.

Even was built for design and simulation, SolidWorks has a big attraction for 3D printers. This means that you can use the tool to transform a digital robotic component into a physical robotic part.

Tutorials and Resources

You can start learning SolidWork using tutorials or you can use one of many free books available on the Internet. Regardless of the option chosen for learning, this article aiming to help you with tutorials and resources to start designing and simulation robots with SolidWorks.

• VEXplorer Robot Kit – a series of short movies to learn how to simulate the well-known VEXplorer robotic kit;
• Getting Started with SolidWorks – very well documented video tutorials that teach you how to build a part, a mechanism, how to use the teamwork tools, and many more tools;
• Solid Student – blog that cover tutorials for designing and simulation;
• SolidWorks Tutorials – another blog with a lot of helpful tutorials and resources;
• SolidWorks Tutorials – more and more tutorials are coming from this blog that covers a wide range of ‘How To’ articles;
• Learn SolidWorks – a blog with a full library of tutorials and free e-books;
• Video tutorials – directory with hundred video tutorials about SW;
• SolidWorks Tutorials – few tutorials for beginners;
• SolidWorks 101 – a blog with tutorials that covers chapters like ‘ Getting Started’ and up to ‘ AMPY the Robot – camera’, or ‘ AMPY – assembly’, or ‘ AMPY – export’;
• SolidWorks Tutorials – if you want to learn from video tutorials how to use basic features of SW such as line, circle, rectangle, smart dimension and sketch relations, in this blog you can find all necessary resources;
• SolidWorks – another blog with SW tutorials and resources;
• The BallBot1 Robot Project – tutorials that contain all steps to simulate the BallBot1 robot;
• SolidWorks models – library with a comprehensive database of SW models for a wide range of robot;
• Read SolidWorks Blogs – here are available a list with community blogs related to SolidWorks;
• SolidWorks – Add-Ons & Third-Party Tools – comprehensive list with add-ons and third-party tools SolidWorks compatible;