Today we will be looking at a great new enhancement that has been rolled out with the new release of SOLIDWORKS 2018; the ability to mirror 3D Sketch entities. While mirroring 2D sketch entities has been possible for well over a decade, it can be invaluable in the way a designer goes about creating a model. 3D sketch entities, on the other hand, have remained impossible to mirror – until now. New in SOLIDWORKS 2018, 3D sketch entities can be mirrored, drastically improving the way parts are created using 3D sketches.
To show this feature, a set of handlebars will be designed for this chopper. Utilizing the mirror entities tool in a 3D sketch will assist in accomplishing this task with far fewer steps than before.
Mirroring 3D sketch entities starts with creating the sketch geometry inside a new 3D sketch.First, begin a 3D sketch and create the sketch geometry to be mirrored.
The Mirror Entities tool now mirrors 3D sketch geometry about a plane, previously limited to 2D sketches.After the geometry has been created, activate the mirror entities tool, which now includes the ability to mirror with respect to a plane for 3D sketch entities. In previous releases of SOLIDWORKS, the mirror entities command was limited to mirror 2D sketch geometry and required a linear entity to mirror about.
The mirror plane, selected from the graphics area or flyout FeatureManager, varies by model geometry.In this example, the right plane has been chosen to mirror about; however, this will vary from model to model depending on the desire mirror direction of the sketch entities.Ā The mirror plane can be chosen by selecting a plane visible in the graphics area, or by using the flyout FeatureManager design tree, which can be accessed by clicking the small arrow near the top-right of the FeatureManager.
Mirrored 3D sketch entities behave like a mirrored 2D sketch, keeping both sides symmetric as changes are made.Once the 3D sketch entities have been mirrored, they will behave in the same manner as a typical mirrored 2D sketch, by mimicking each side to maintain the symmetric sketch relation.
Mirroring 3D sketch entities in SOLIDWORKS 2018 opens new design options while keeping design intent robust.The new ability to mirror 3D sketch entities in SOLIDWORKS 2018 opens up a variety of new ways to design while maintaining robust, yet simple design intent. For more information, check out our YouTube channel, get a SOLIDWORKS 3D CAD quote or contact us at Hawk Ridge Systems today. Thanks for reading!
