Part III: Working with Assemblies
Width mate
The Width mate is often used as a replacement for the Symmetric mate in situations where parts
are modeled with some tolerance and have a gap rather than touching face to face. The Width mate
requires two pairs of faces to be selected, and works particularly well when a part has to be spaced
evenly between two faces and there is no mid-plane; for example, when a square key is placed in a
square keyway that is somewhat larger than the key. If a mid-plane is available, the Symmetric
mate may be a better option, or at least a faster one to mate given the Symmetric mate only
requires two faces and a plane. Figure 13.12 shows a good application for a Width mate as well as
the PropertyManager interface for the mate.
FIGURE 13.12Applying a Width mate
Gear mate
The Gear mate enables you to establish gear type relations between parts without making the parts
physically mesh. You can also apply gear ratios and directions without physical connections, so
that you can have a shaft in and a shaft out of a black-box transmission. You can open the assembly
shown in Figure 13.13 from the CD-ROM. It is named Chapter 13 Gear Mate.sldasm. To see
the effect of the mate, open the assembly and rotate the parts. Then edit the mate and change the
ratio and direction. The selection for the Gear mate is just two cylindrical faces.