SolidWorks 2010 Bible

CHAPTER

Using Plastic

Features and

Mold Tools

IN THIS CHAPTER

Exploring plastic features

Learning about plastic

evaluation tools

Understanding SolidWorks’

capabilities with mold

geometry

Using Mold Tools manually

Working with plastic features

tutorial

S

olidWorks has several tools that are specific to modeling and evaluat-
ing plastic parts. These tools can help simplify and standardize some
of the complex repetitive tasks involved with plastic part design.
Another set of task-specific tools exist for automating mold cavity/core mod-
eling tasks. So whether you are a plastic part designer or an injection mold
designer, SolidWorks offers tools tailored to your needs.

You can manually do all the work that these tools automate, and sometimes
you need to be able to do the work manually when the automated tools do
not provide the needed options or flexibility.

Because of the specific needs of plastic part modeling and mold design,
SolidWorks has a set of powerful evaluation tools that help you query 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 con-
serves 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 is 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 the
reader already has a grasp of basic plastics and mold design.