I’m really excited about a great new resource available to all those engineers, scientists, students, and enthusiasts out there that perhaps never got exposed to CNC machining while in their college years (like yours truly) and/or that wish to learn the basics on how to program and operate a Computer Numerical Control (CNC) milling machine.  It is a book  -actually  it’s a complete course w...

While at the partner’s pavilion during SolidWorks World 2009, I watched a very nice demo of a 3D modeling product known as SolidThinking. I must say, with my very limited knowledge of surface modeling in SolidWorks,  I was very impressed by how easy it was to create and modify all sorts of capricious shapes starting from very simple geometry and/or dragging around, pushing and pulling the alrea...

As some of you know, I’ve been using Twitter for a short while already. You can find me as avephoenix, if you wish to follow.  It is kind of useful at times, I suppose.  Hmmm, on second thought, don’t bother, because I may just cancel that Twitter account, anyway. These are a couple of interesting articles that I found about the use of Twitter; just wanted to share them here and see wha...

 Fear is one of the most powerful emotions a human being can ever experience.  It can trigger quick thoughts and actions that will help us fight back or flee from whatever situation we perceive as danger; it can be paralyzing, as well, robbing us of valuable experiences and opportunities that we may have otherwise enjoyed.  Take me for example: I used to be afraid of driving the freeway. The th...

Just received the news today that the proceedings from SolidWorks World 2009 are already out and available for all at www.solidworks.com/sww2009proceedings   Notice that you will need to login to access the materials; simply use your username/email  and password that you use to sign up to the customer portal. If you don’t already have a login for the customer portal, you can create one by c...

Wow! It seems like an eternity since the last time I updated this blog. Well, it hasn’t been an eternity, of course, but it feels that way because I used to post frequently. I have a few good reasons for my lack of activity, though.  Double whammy baseball season is the one you already know. I have less time to write than I used to, but there’s something else…  I’m currently digging deep...

This is a small post in hopes to answer a question from one of the visitors to this blog. How to apply a limit angle mate in SolidWorks? Well, for illustration purposes, I created this little assembly of a couple of thin plates, and mated one of their edges coincident to the corresponding edge in the other plate, so that they could rotate about each other like a hinge. Now, it’s time to apply t...

Little league baseball season has already started and once again I’ve found myself stuck for hours on the bleachers of some school baseball field. This year I have two baseball players, now that Master Andrew has decided he’s got game and joined the Shetland division. That’s a long time on the bleachers!  To try and do something useful with all that time, rather than listening on the latest...