HOW TO USE SCHEMATICS FOR CREATING HARNESS IN 3D?

SolidWorks 3D CAD Design software is widely known across the engineering and designing industry. It is this software’s impeccable capabilities that has won it such phenomenal user base. One of the prime offerings of SolidWorks is SolidWorks Electrical, whose schematic design capabilities simplifies the process of developing embedded systems for machines and other applications.

As a useful tool for creating harnesses in 3D, SolidWorks Electricals has helped engineers and designers tremendously. This is the reason why we decided to discuss about using this tool for creating harness in 3D as well as exporting it back to the 2D project.

Assuming that you have already routed a harness between several electrical components, we will herein discuss about creating 2D drawing of the harness.

First, start by opening up the harness in a new window. To do that, right click on it inside the Feature Manager Tree and then, select Open Subassembly or Open Subassembly in Position.

Next, you would need to flatten the route by switching over to the Electrical Command Manager. There, click on Flatten Route and you will receive a pop-up of Property Manager displaying some options. It will ask you to choose between two flatten types, namely, Annotation and Manufacture. First is a simplified representation of the harness. The second is creator of nail board presentation. Feel free to have your pick.

Beyond that you will find flatten options that you can choose to display the connectors as 3D or 2D blocks. Again, pick the option that fits your design the best and move to the next step.

The bottom of the window will show Drawing options. Click on the box and it will turn on. Choose the options that best fit your design. After you have chosen your options and turned off the rest by clicking on the box next to the name, you will be able to flatten the route and create the 2D drawing by simply hitting the green check.

Now, to put this back into your SolidWorks Electrical 2D Schematic, simply hide the sheet format, right-click in the graphics area, select properties and finally, uncheck display sheet format.

After this, when you will switch to the SolidWorks Electrical Drawing command manager tab and select Create Project Drawing you may receive the warning to save your 2D drawing, which you can save by clicking yes.

Though it may appear as if nothing has happened but in reality, as you switch over to the 2D project, you will find a new schematic has been created. Open it to see your flattened harness drawing.

Learn more about it by signing up for SolidWorks Electrical RoutingTraining at FEA Training Consultants.