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Archive for May, 2008

The second meeting of the Tri-Valley SolidWorks User Group will be held on June 18^th at the Holiday Inn Express in Dublin, CA, and  it’s looking really promising already, full of information and hands-on  learning opportunities. I’m really excited because many of the topics in the agenda fit perfectly with what I’m studying these days:  Smart Components, Smart Mates, Assembly Design Tables, among others. Also, our leader, Kenneth Barrentine will be presenting about Deconstructing a Vacuum Chamber. That sounds like something really interesting! Here, check out the rest of the agenda.

6:30pm – 7:00pm Registration, Food/Drinks

7:00pm – 8:30pm Automating SolidWorks using: Macros, Part Design Tables, Mating & Smart

Mates, Smart Components, Assembly Design Tables, KBE tools presented by Brian Titus

8:30pm – 8:45pm Break

8:45pm – 9:15pm Weldments, deconstructing a Vacuum Chamber presented by Kenneth Barrentine

9:15pm – 9:30pm Wrap Up, Prize Drawings, Next Meeting Agenda & Date

I’m bringing my laptop with me (of course!) and, perhaps, my little (digital) camera, to take a few pictures, or even film Kenneth’s presentation, as long as he doesn’t mind. I don’t promise anything on that one, though, just in case the presentation involves a hands-on exercise or requires our participation, in which case I’ll be too busy to hold a camera, but I’ll try.

So, if you are in the area that evening and want to check it out, you are certainly welcome to join. The more the merrier!  Just RSVP with Kenneth today.  See you there!

While going through the SolidWorks Training Manual on Advanced Assemblies, I ran into this little piece of information,  that  is so simple and easy, it kind of left me scratching my scalp, wondering how come I didn’t think about it before.  I’m talking about removing external references in a part document that was created or edited in the context of an assembly and made to reference the geometry of other components.

Why would you even want to do that? Well, you know that all external references that are established when you create a part in-context are going to remain with the part, and any change to the part done in the context of the assembly will also appear in the part document and affect other parts that it references to, causing them to change, as well.  If you wanted to use a part that was created in the context of an assembly  X inside a different, unrelated, assembly, say assembly Y,  then you need to first make sure that the changes made to assembly X  and/or any of its parts are no longer going to propagate to the part.  Sure, you can List External References in the part and choose to Lock All or Break All. If you lock them all, you stop the changes from propagating, but only temporarily, because they can be unlocked later on (either by you or the ever helpful co-worker).  Breaking the references, on the other hand, is irreversible and can’t be fixed. Changes will no longer propagate to the part, and this will definitely affect the design intent of your original assembly. So, it makes perfect sense when the manual recommends  that in order to produce a completely independent part you must  remove the external references instead, by following these very easy steps.

First, you should save the part document as a copy, so you can remove the external references from this copy without affecting the original assembly at all. It’s important to save the part as a copy of the original, because if you just Save As with a different name, this “new” part document will simply replace the original in the assembly.  Next, once you have created a copy of the part document, you will need to search its Feature Manager for  features that may have external references. You will be able to recognize them by noticing the symbols “->?” that are listed next to them.  These symbols tell you that the feature has an external reference, but that it’s out of context right now. All these references can be removed by editing the features and sketches that contain them to delete such references and add new ones. This is very easy to do with sketches, and lucky for us it’s very often that a sketch is the one that contains the external reference and not the feature itself.  Simply edit the sketch that has the external reference, click Display/ Delete Relations, and list all the relations that are external. Delete all the external relations and dimensions and  proceed to fully define the sketch, either manually or by clicking on Fully Define Sketch. This last step is a very important one and you should not forget about it, especially when removing external relations on geometry that was created by converting or offsetting entities, since they are left completely unconstrained, with no relations at all, after the on edge or offset relations are removed. Also remember that you should do this starting from the bottom of the feature manager and work your way up, to prevent the part from becoming disjoint.

Simple, isn’t it? Now if I could only find a way to do something similar to this for a part that was created by splitting another one or by saving bodies in a multi body part. But so far I can’t see a way this can be done, because there is no feature or sketch  whatsoever that could be edited in this kind of parts, so, even you break the references, to make it “independent” from its parent, it still pretty much works like a parasolid, an imported model that gives you no access or control over its history.  It would be great if there was a way to access that history or somehow add dimensions and relations, like when fully defining a sketch, in order to manipulate its already existent features, instead of simply adding new ones. Maybe I’m rambling here, so please forgive my ignorance if I am.  I’m still in SW2007, so I have no idea if perhaps this is already possible in SW2008 or will be possible in SW2009. It would be great! If I was to choose what is the one thing I like the most about working with SolidWorks, I would have to say that it is being able to access and manipulate the history of the part. The more of that history you can manipulate, edit, change and drive, the better! I love that feature manager! OK, now that I got that off my chest, it’s back to working on that manual.

This week started with sad news about the recent passing of Mr. Eugenio Garza Lagüera, who was for many years head of the Tecnológico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, my alma mater.  He was a man of firm convictions; a real role model of integrity and excellence for all in the college community.  Deeply admired and respected by all of us. For some reason, ever since hearing about this, I’m finding myself thinking about those last days in college, about classmates, friends and people I haven’t seen in a long time, and that who knows if I’ll ever see again.

Around this same day, only twelve years ago,  a few friends and I decided to do something special in order to celebrate what we perceived as  the beginning of the rest of our lives.  The last week of college had felt like an anti-climax. The finals were over. All the projects have been presented, evaluated, judged and defended.  The rings had been chosen, ordered and paid for. All the pictures were taken. The diplomas were printed and signed, ready for the graduation ceremony, just a few days away. Many of us had already received job offers or had plans for continuing education abroad. But somehow, instead of feeling that tremendous joy and relief we always thought we would experience on that very last day of college, it just felt as if time had stopped and the world around us stood still.  “These are strange days”, my best friend said to me that night when he drove me home. “Tomorrow, we’ll do something grand”, he added with a boyish grin,  and then he left. He showed up at my place early the next morning. He wouldn’t say where we were going, but he told me to wear sneakers.  Three other friends were already in the car. Once we were all together, I learned we were headed towards Tepoztlán, Morelos. We were going to hike up El Tepozteco  mountain, to visit the ruins of the temples at the top. Now, at this point I think I should mention something about myself: I’m not and have never been a very athletic person. This hike was a first for me, but I’m really glad I went with them, because this experience changed something inside of me for the better.  You’ll see what I mean.

The first part of the way to the top seemed really easy.  There was a narrow path and even what resembled steps, probably made by the same people that built the temples, hundreds of years ago. We laughed and joked about how great hikers we were, as we danced our way to the top.  We wanted to run to the top and back, so we could have time to visit the market, have dinner and maybe go somewhere else before the day was over. My friend, who had been there many times before, simply smiled and told us to slow down. He said if we were lucky, we would make it back down before sunset and then we would visit the market, and grab a bite to eat on the way back to the city. We looked at him as if he had lost his mind, but soon enough we found out what he meant  by “before sunset”, as the narrow path and the steps disappeared before our eyes, and were replaced by rocks and slippery mud. Soon, we were down on hands and knees, painfully crawling our way up, our carefree hike turned into a slow struggle.

Every single step of the way, we had to keep focused, be careful where we put our hands and feet to avoid slipping down the steep. There was almost no place to stop and rest. We just had to keep moving because there were others coming behind us (it’s a very popular place) and there was hardly any room for anyone else. It was a hard way to the top, but wouldn’t you know it was also a very enjoyable one. Even while in fear of falling, we never lost our sense of humor, although our laughter often got confused in our screams of panic.  All in all, we still managed to laugh and joke as we helped each other, and even others, along the way.  As a great leader would do, my friend got the ball rolling, by coming up and down to give us a hand whenever we got stuck. Soon, all of us, even though inexperienced hikers, were doing the same for the people that came after us. It felt really good.

What we found at the top wasn’t really that impressive. The temple was small and lacking on the kind of splendor found in Monte Alban or Tenochtitlan. We climbed to the top of the pyramid and stayed there for a while, in silence, just taking in all the beauty and majesty of the valley and mountains around us. Then we slowly started on our way down, just as we climbed up, screaming and laughing all along the way.

I believe that, as it often happens in life, the best part wasn’t getting to the top, but simply the journey that took us there. Sure, goals are important. It’s important to have goals and to achieve our goals in a timely matter. It’s also important to never run out of new goals to look forward to, or else achieving the goal may end up feeling like the anti-climax we experienced.  However, as I found out that day, the real  gain is often that of what you learn in the process. It’s what you discover about yourself and others, the friendships and guidance that you find and share along the way, and how the journey transforms you in ways you never expected or even dreamed possible. A few months ago I started my own journey with a simple  goal: to update myself in order to become employable again. Never for one second I imagined just how exactly that journey would look like, what “places” it would take me through on the way to my goal, how difficult, painful, exciting, exhilarating and fun (all at the same time) it would be, and just how much it would transform me. Well, never for one second I thought I would be blogging about it, to begin with!

Many years have passed since that day. My best friend moved to Germany, I came to live to the United States. We lost contact with each other. Life has a way to do that to you. I never actually thanked neither my friend nor Mr. Garza Lagüera for the many ways in which they touched my life while I was still a college student, many years ago, although I’m forever grateful to them, just as I am grateful now to all those SolidWorks leaders, hikers and sherpas, that have helped me along the way and continue to make this “hike” unique and unforgettable. Thank you guys!  And thank you for reading all the way to this last paragraph. You are as patient as a saint! Sorry, no tips or tricks on this one, just a tribute to all of those people, like Mr. Eugenio Garza Lagüera, that are changing the world, one life at a time.

As a female mechanical engineer, I always feel an overwhelming excitement whenever I find other women venturing in engineering, be it as professionals or students. I rejoice whenever I find women involved in science and technology, but particularly in engineering, since, in my country at least,  engineering is still a mainly male-dominated area, slowly opening up to women.  And women have so much to offer!

One of the things that I really like about this country is the encouragement that is being given to girls of all ages to pursue a career in science and technology.  I wish I had found that kind of support while I was a college student in Mexico!  Now that I’m a much older woman (a senile 34 year old), my college years way behind me, I often also wish that I could find a way to encourage other young women to become engineers, but right where I stand at the moment, in the middle of my own transition, there’s not really much that I can inspire or encourage others to. At least, that’s what I used to think, until recently, when I ran into this young lady at one of my son’s baseball games. I had noticed her once before. She was staring at me from the other side of the field, but it wasn’t until I put on my baseball cap that she came over to take a closer look. Yes, well, that particular day my husband and younger son had already taken the other baseball caps, and the only one left had the logo of the team my son was playing against, so I decided it was OK for me to look geeky in style and sport my SolidWorks baseball cap to the game. Anyway, she came over and asked me if I was Gabi, the blogger. Wow! Somebody reads this tripe! Well, it actually gets better than that, because she also told me that she’s a community college student, looking forward to transfer to a four year college to pursue a major in engineering. Then she said to me something that really made my day: she said that reading stories of engineer women like me and others has inspired her and, many times, kept her from giving up when times get tough.  Now, isn’t that something? To realize that this journey that I started for myself is actually helping others in their own journey is such an awesome thing… And it’s humbling too.

So, here it goes for this young lady, and for anyone else who might be interested. She asked me a question about Smart Fasteners and Hole Series (just my luck!). She wants to find a way to add  more than one smart fastener to a series of holes, to replace  a very long one that goes through several  parts in the assembly. After searching in the manual and online help and playing with it for a while to try to understand what she was talking about, I found that what she wants to do can actually be accomplished and is known as splitting a hole series. The tricky part is, however,  that you can’t really do this if the holes were created by an assembly feature. In other words, you can’t split the hole series if you used Hole Series command to create the series of holes. Does that make any sense? Each hole the Smart Fastener goes through has to be created by an individual feature, at the part level,for this to work.

So, imagine you have an assembly such as the one in the following image.

All the holes were created in the individual parts and then mated together in the assembly with concentric mates, so they would be aligned. If we use Smart Fasteners to apply some hardware to it, with this arrangement, we’ll get the following results. It doesn’t matter what hole we attempt to select, it will only allow us to select one.

If what we really wanted was to have a couple of short fasteners instead of a long one, we can split the hole series (break the fastener into two) as follows. First, if the Smart Fasteners property manager isn’t open already, open it by right clicking on the smart fastener icon in the feature manager and selecting Edit Feature from the menu. Once in the dialog box, expand Series 1, like in the image, to see all the hole features the Smart Fastener goes through.  Decide which hole features you want the new fastener to go through. In this case, we have four hole features and we want one fastener to go through the first two holes and the second one to go through the last two holes in the series. Drag the first hole feature for the new fastener (in this case, the third one in the series) and drop it on the fastener’s name at  the top level of the tree. By doing this, this hole feature and any other hole feature that comes after this one in the original series will now be part of a new series for the second Smart Fastener. The first two holes will remain in the original series. A message box will appear telling you that this operation will likely result in fasteners of different lengths. You have the option of choosing if you want to calculate new fastener lengths for both series or if you want to keep the original length for both of them.

Once the splitting operation is done, you now have two fasteners instead of one, each with its own hole series. If you don’t like the orientation of the fastener, you can always flip it, by right clicking on Series 1 and choosing Flip from the menu.

As a side note,  if the orientation of the parts in this assembly was slightly different, like in the following image, this whole procedure wouldn’t be necessary in order to have two fasteners instead of one. We could simply select two of the holes (see selection in the image) and two fasteners would be added.

So, there you have it. I hope it helped someone out there. And for all of you that may be reading this, if you have ever wished you could inspire others to pursue a career in engineering, mathematics, science and/or technology, please, consider becoming a mentor for women and others under-represented in these fields. Check out Mentor Net , if you wish, or simply go and take the time to share some of your knowledge and experience with others. You never know who you may inspire just by being yourself!

The school year is soon coming to an end. For many, it means vacation time, long lazy days of fun and play, and perhaps a few trips to the beach. For most of my neighbors it also means finding alternative, and hopefully affordable, daycare options that  may work for them while school is out.  Due to the high cost of living in this area, most of my neighbors are two income families, both of them working for some company in the Silicon Valley. During most of the year, a combination of school and a few hours of childcare works really well.  For the Summer, however, you can see them making all kinds of arrangements for back to back day camps, summer classes, sports and activities, etc., that are not precisely childcare, certainly not as expensive as a nanny or a daycare center, but that will have to double as daycare, just so they can continue to work, and save a few dollars. Sometimes, I feel a mix of guilt and sadness when I realize that I’ll soon be joining “the club”.  Sometimes, I feel a bit envious of my next door neighbor. She works as a teacher and has vacation time whenever her kids are on vacation. Her schedule also allows her to be home when the kids come back from school, so the only times she ever needs childcare is when her children are sick.  I don’t think I would like to teach elementary school, like she does, but if I was to become a teacher someday, perhaps I would teach Science and Technology… Or,   I could even teach SolidWorks! What? One can have dreams, right?

Other friends and neighbors, male and female alike, have managed to negotiate a flexible schedule that allows them to work from home one or two days a week, or at least every other week.  Even one of my husband’s Marketing guys has recently asked him to allow him to do just that. He doesn’t have small kids at home, but he commutes from another city, and the price of gas is burning his budget. I often wonder how easy it is to find that kind of flexibility in a CAD job.  I don’t think it should be that hard, but  who knows, I may be wrong. I’ve researched a bit about flexible jobs for mothers,  and found that what’s available often serves candidates in non-engineering areas. I’ve found sites like MomCorps, for instance, that matches candidates with companies offering part-time, contract or full time flexible jobs.  But when I did a quick search,  there was nothing available for an engineer in this area. So, how much flexibility is there for an engineer mother of small children? How much flexibility is there in a CAD job? I guess that’s what I’m going to find out real soon.