SolidWorks 2010 Bible

Chapter 17: Using Hole Wizard and Toolbox .............................................................................

FIGURE 17.2

A design tree containing a Hole Wizard hole

Placement sketch

The placement sketch is listed first under the Hole Wizard feature. It contains one or more sketch

points marking the hole centers. It may also contain construction geometry with relations and

dimensions to parametrically locate the hole centers. I discuss placement sketches in more detail in

the next section.

Hole sketch

The revolve profile sketch is not on an identifiable sketch plane that you can reuse for other features,

although that would be useful. You can change the sketch dimensions outside of the wizard interface,

and if you later use the wizard to edit it, then the changes appear in the Custom Sizing panel.

Figure 17.3 shows the Custom Sizing panel with the changed counterbore diameter highlighted.

FIGURE 17.3

The Custom Sizing area of the Hole Specifications panel

If you select any of the choices from the Options panel, the revolved sketch profile is altered to

accommodate the change. For example, if you select the check box for a near side countersink, the

sketch changes to add a line for the countersink; a separate chamfer feature is not added.

2D versus 3D placement sketches

In SolidWorks 2010, SolidWorks changed the Hole Wizard so that it defaults to a 2D sketch. Pre-

selection of a plane or planar face is still recommended because it eliminates a step later on, but it

is no longer required in order to avoid being forced into a 3D placement sketch. 3D placement