Designing A Sheet Metal Enclosure With Solidworks

The base flange feature is created from a sketch.

Designing a sheet metal enclosure with solidworks. So take a firsthand walk through designing a sheet metal enclosure for circuit boards and panel mounted connectors as well as fans power cords and switches with solidworks. Solidworks 2012 and up. That means you need a contour of the sheet metal to be cut known as a flat pattern. Https youtu be oloi1ogbsx8 amazon free unlimi.

However it s up to us as designers to use these tools to create parts that can be easily and efficiently manufactured. Sheet metal enclosures house and protect circuitry wiring and other sensitive electronic parts and frequently require customization by a professional cad designer. A base flange is the first feature in a new sheet metal part. You can design a sheet metal part on its own without any references to the parts it will enclose you can design the part in the context of an assembly that contains the enclosed components or you can design the part within another part document in a multibody environment.

Gabriel sheet metal is a complex industry and understanding the basic process and fundamentals is essential to designing parts that are easy to manufacture. However in some circumstances when the design requires certain types of geometry you can use non sheet metal feature tools then insert bends or convert the part to sheet metal. The real power of solidworks comes when you have to design bent sheet metal a task which looks simple but really isn t. Before any bending you have to cut the sheet metal.

Solidworks sheet metal enclosure part design. How to make bike anti theft system. So take a firsthand walk. There are specific sheet metal features you can use to create sheet metal bodies quickly.

You might also like. Bends are added wherever appropriate and sheet metal specific features are added to the feature manager design tree. Sheet metal parts are generally used as enclosures for components or to provide support to other components. As a standard feature solidworks make this pattern for you based it on your previously designed model.

When you add a base flange feature to a solidworks part the part is marked as a sheet metal part. Real world projects are vital to mastering solidworks and sheet metal enclosures are a perfect example of a typical project. Throughout these lessons we will be creating a sheet metal part for an electrical enclosure confined and driven by a design envelope along with various tools including the edge and miter flanges bolt holes a vent and various other features.