From the course: SOLIDWORKS: Integrated CAM with HSMXpress

Loading models and assemblies

From the course: SOLIDWORKS: Integrated CAM with HSMXpress

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Loading models and assemblies

- [Instructor] Okay, now that we have SolidWorks set up, we've got HSM installed, we have a part on the screen that we'd like to machine, now we need to start building an assembly inside of SolidWorks so we can easily machine this component. Now, of course we could just start machining this component right now, but let me show you a little bit more complicated but easier way to do this, because that will allow you to do all the operations in one job without having to set up multiple times. You can use the same tools for multiple operations and so on, so let me show you how I generally do this, and if you use this method, it will generally save you a considerable amount of time to set it up in SolidWorks first, and then start your machining operations. So the first thing I want to do is bring in the table of the machine that I'm going to be working with. So I need to create an assembly. So let's go over here and click on New, come down here to Assembly, and I'm just using the templates from the template folder that I've included with the exercise files. Now, you don't have to use these templates. You can use your own, it doesn't matter. If you'd like to add these templates, that would be fine as well. So either way, just go ahead and create an assembly, click on OK, and now we've got an assembly. Now, before we jump in and start adding components to this, I want to show you a couple cool ways to use the design library, and it's definitely my recommended method for creating any type of assembly, especially with reusable components like the ones we're going to be using. So just go ahead and exit out of this, so I'm just in the assembly but I'm not adding any components. Now, over here on the right hand side you can see we have the design library. So here's my basic design library that's included with SolidWorks, and you can also add in your own design library if you'd like to. Now, let me show you two different ways to do this. Before adding in the design library, I could just come over here and go File, Open, I could look into this folder Exercise Files, come down here to LinkedInLib, or LinkedIn Library, open that up. Under fixtures, you can see here I've got a Haas rotary table, I've got a Kurt vice, I've got a table from a VF3 machine, which is a Haas machine. I also have a couple different Kurt vices in here you can just flip through and take a look at. And I'm going to include all these so you can play with them and kind of build your own fixtures if you want to use some Chick fixturing or Kurt vices or so on. I'm going to go ahead and include all of those for your use, and you can also download these directly from Chick as well as Kurt, and they generally have all of their workholding options available for download for use in your design. So definitely pick a couple of those to get started. Now, over here let's go ahead and choose the table, click on Open, and I have this table in here. I can then go ahead and then just drag and drop that into my assembly. So I'm going to click on Tie Horizontally. I'm going to grab this table and drag it into my assembly, right? That's one way we could do this. I could then grab a vice and bring it in. I could bring in the part and drag and drop it in. That's one way and it works just fine, but it's so much easier if you actually add these components to your library. So go ahead and just click on this component here and delete that out. All right. Now let's go ahead and add a library location. So click over here on the library, come up here to this one called Add File Location, click on that. I'm going to go ahead over here to the desktop, come down to exercise files, come down here to LinkedInLib, click on that and click on OK. So now we've just added that library location. Now, if you look inside of there you can see I've got those fixtures. Open that up and I have all those same things that were available to me just by searching on the file system. Now they're in the library. So if you want to bring in that table, just drag and drop. Super easy, right? And now it's attached to my tool tip. Hit Escape to get rid of that. I want to make sure this is actually the origin, so generally when you drag and drop something in, it automatically makes it fixed. So you notice that little F right there in the front. If I right click on it, I come down here to Float, so it does float around on my screen, now I can click on the origin of this component here and the origin of the assembly and go ahead and mate those together. So go under Assembly, click on Mate, those are going to slide together. And now I have the origin of the table at the exact origin of my assembly, and that's how we want to start off. All right, and once you have that in there, let's go ahead and grab a couple of vices. So go over here back to the library, come down here. I'm going to go to a Kurt vice, and let's just kind of look at one of these. This one looks pretty good. Let's go ahead and just drag that in. Let's put two of those in there for fun. And so I've got two of these Kurt vices in here, and let's go ahead and just build that assembly up. So I'm going to go ahead and mate, not that face there, I want to mate the top surface of the table to the bottom of the vice. All right, let's do that a couple different times. So over here, same thing. And top of the table. So now we drop those vices on there. Now of course we can spin these around, or however you want to set them up, so I'm going to spin this one like that, spin this one like that, and let's arrange these on the table like you would actually be machining these components. So I'm going to go ahead and make a distance over here, so I'm going to say that's going to be 10 inches from the edge of the table. Let's put this front edge here right on the front of the table. But you can see here that's probably not going to work, right? So you can see that we don't have a bolt hole here. So that's a problem. And that's what you figure out when you're doing this, is hey, how can we place these vices on the table to get the most space, just so when we do create a setup sheet for creating this thing, we actually see how everything's going to be set up on the table for real. So let's go ahead and get rid of that last one I added. So go down here to Mate. This one here, let's get rid of that one, and then when I come over to Mate, this time let's go ahead and use what's called a Width Mate, so I'm going to go over here under Advanced Mates, right up here is Width Mate, and I'm going to use the inside of this hole here, those two surfaces, and then I'm going to go ahead and use for the tab this inside surface here and this one right over here. So now that's automatically centered on there, so that's a little bit more reasonable. Click OK. And then to make it really easy and not having to add that width mate one more time, let's go ahead and just choose that back surface there and the back surface of this other vice, just pick those two. Those should slide together. Right, and then we just move this over a little bit, and then as far as spacing, let's just add a few inches between the two vices. So go ahead and type in eight inches. All right. So now you can see we've got two vices on a table, and now we're ready to start. I'm going to go ahead and hide this little sketch. So notice I have this sketch here, and that's the usable or machinable area on that table. We can't machine to the very edges of the table, so that is the usable area of this CNC machine that I can actually operate in, so I'm just using that as a reference to make sure that I put all of my components inside of that rectangle. But now we know where the vices are, we should just go ahead and hide that so it makes it a little bit less confusing. All right, now I've got these components in here. Let's go ahead and bring my part in. So go up here to Tile Horizontally. I've got this component right here, which is the 1.2. Let's go ahead and just drag that into this top level assembly. There it is. And then let's go ahead and place it in the vice. Now, in this case we'd probably use something like a parallel to place it in the vice or maybe you have a stepjaw. Doesn't really matter, but you probably want to think that through ahead of time. So click on Mate. I'm going to go ahead and choose this bottom surface here to the bottom surface of the part, all right. And then go ahead and add a spacing. So you might have, let's say we're going to use .75 or three-quarter inch parallels. .75. That's going to space this block directly above that, so that high above it. And generally, you might say like, hey, this back surface here and this back surface here, let's go ahead and mate those together, and so on. So this is how you'd pretty much start, but the only problem is, this is the finished part. This is not the stock. This is just a basic part that we want to create, and so more than likely we're not going to be grabbing onto the finished part. We're going to be grabbing onto a piece of stock, and then we're going to be removing some material to create this final shape. So let's go ahead and create the stock shape ahead of time, and then come back and we'll continue on here creating and setting up for this first operation.

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