Dassault Systèmes, the French software company behind the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, has launched SOLIDWORKS 2020, the 28th edition of its portfolio of 3D design and engineering software.
SOLIDWORKS 2020 features improved performance, streamlined workflows, and support for a connected design ecosystem in the cloud. This includes the new Detailing mode and graphics acceleration for drawings, the Make Parts Flexible option and slicing functions for 3D printing.
“We aren’t just bringing powerful new capabilities to the SOLIDWORKS portfolio everybody knows and loves, but also extending it to the cloud through the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, the only holistic digital experience platform in the world,” said Gian Paolo Bassi, CEO, SOLIDWORKS, Dassault Systèmes.
“We’ve built a bridge to our platform-based portfolio, empowering our users to take advantage of 3DEXPERIENCE.WORKS offerings. This gives organizations the environment and the applications to truly embrace the Industry Renaissance and its spirit of discovery for new ways of inventing, innovating, collaborating and producing.”
SOLIDWORKS 2020
For the existing 6 million users, SOLIDWORKS 2020 has integrated hundreds of new enhancements, according to Dassault Systèmes, in response to their demands. Of these enhancements is the New Detailing mode and graphics acceleration for drawings. This enables designers to open their drawings in seconds while maintaining the ability to add and edit annotations within the drawing or large assemblies with many sheets, configurations, or resource-intensive views.
To further accelerate additive manufacturing, a searchable database of 3D printers has been added with envelope information. This generates 2D slice data from high-quality solid geometry as opposed to a tessellated file and provides the ability to save this information to the 3MF format. The SOLIDWORKS interface has also been improved for users to easily access 3DEXPERIENCE Marketplace Make where a 3D printed part can be quickly prototyped or outsource.
Direct Mesh Editing & Make Part Flexible
A Direct Mesh Editing enhancement has been included in SOLIDWORKS 2020. This improves the ability to directly edit boundary representation (BREP) mesh formats such as STL through new tools like Fillet, Chamfer, Mutual Trim, Knit Surfaces, Delete Hole, and Delete & Fill.
Furthermore, the newly added Make Part Flexible capability allows users to display the same part in different conditions in the same assembly. For instance, the same spring in an assembly in two different conditions, i.e. compressed and not compressed.
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Featured image shows the slicing of a part using the new 3D printer generating database. Clip via Dassault Systèmes.
