The Due Date Is When???
November 11, 2007 4 Comments
Over the past couple of weeks I have done a lot of thinking about how to set up templates for commonly used designs to speed up design time. In the industry that we are in (deep drawn metal stamping) almost all of our jobs have multiple stations that lead to producing the final product. In most cases the majority of these stations are common designs that may only be different by a few dimensions. So with these facts in front of me and multiple due dates all piled on top of each other has forced me to begin thinking about how to speed up my design time so that I can hit ALL of these due dates without a problem. Around a year ago I began to dabble with a product call DriveWorks which is a design automation program that runs inside of SolidWorks. Now at the time I messed around with it the price tag scared our company off having just spent the money to switch to SolidWorks and CamWorks. But here is the kicker, in SolidWorks 2008 SolidWorks has partnered with DriveWorks to incorporate a program called DriveWorksXpress included in the software. Now it just means that I have to find the time to play around with it more and set it up to benefit our company, I do believe this is a breakout session at SolidWorks World that I will have to attend.
If you want more information about this product you need to check out Jeff Mirisola’s Blog because he has just sat through a 3 day training event on DriveWorks.
Free time? What’s that? I hope to have a chance to try the Driveworks Express once we get upgraded to 2008!
We manufacture a lot of parts that are very similar and I believe that this could make a big difference in getting stuff out the door on time or being 4 weeks late. Keep us updated when you have the chance to play with it.
Thanks for leaving the comment. I have some vacation time coming up that I have to use so I am hoping to find time to play around with it.
If I may ask what kind of parts do you make? It is always fun to find out what industries the readers of this blog are in.
We build tunnel pasteurizers for the brewing industry. Basically it is a long rectangular box with divided zones that hold water at varying temperatures that are pumped to overhead sprays that pass over the product to be pasteurized. The product is heated up to kill the bacteria in the product, then is cooled down until discharged. The parts we make are a huge variety. Piping assemblies, large floor plates (18′ wide x 80″ long),
gussets, tapped plates, bolt plates, etc. I can send you an edrawing of our piping and some of the tank section parts if you would like to view them.
That would be awesome if you could send me an edrawing of this, it sounds very cool. I can see where something like DriveWorks would be helpful for you with these. Thanks for responding back to this.
[email protected]