DriveWorks Xpress Case Studies

Actuators

1. How long did it take to create variations BEFORE DriveWorksXpress? - 30 mins to 1 hour

2. How long did it take to set this project up in DriveWorksXpress? - 2 hours

3. How long does it take NOW to create a new variation using DriveWorksXpress? - 5 minutes

4. How many possible variations could there be? - Unlimited

5. How would you describe your experience with DriveWorksXpress? Really easy to setup and use. We are in the process now of installing the full version of DriveWorks because of the ease of use and time savings.

6. Have you shared your work with your colleagues? Yes, all of our SolidWorks users has access to these files.

7. Will you be adding more products and rules?

Absolutely!!

Conveyors

1. How much time did you spend setting up? - 2 days

2. Time spent before SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress? - Approximately 30 to 45 minutes from scratch

3. How long does it take NOW to create a new variation using DriveWorksXpress? - 20 seconds to enter data - 5 minutes to print. Because this is DriveWorksXpress we also need to use "pack & go" to move the new files to the correct directories.

4. How many possible variations could be produced of this assembly? - Because of the nature of the product, it is almost unlimited

5. How would you describe your experience with DriveWorksXpress? Excellent, design automation is the main reason we switched to parametric modelling

6. Have you shared your work with your colleagues? Yes, the products that I have automated with DriveWorksXpress are for anyone who uses SolidWorks

7. Will you be adding more products and rules?

I am currently automating all of our standard product lines.

Storage & Racking Systems

1. Time to set up? - 3 hours. This included the time to work out how the parts would change under certain conditions, and then modelling to these conditions (using planes, dimensioning from critical planes etc..)

2. Time to design product before we had SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress? - 8 hours - It would take an engineer at least a day to produce the parts, assembly and drawings as the soft-ware system being used was not driven parametrically and was not as flexible as it is now.

3. Time to design product now with SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress? - 3 minutes It now takes an engineer a few minutes to specify and produce a new assembly complete with drawings and part numbers already assigned.

4. Number of variations this rule set caters for? - 200,000,000 There are numerous variations that can be produced from this assembly, as the dimensions can change from a unit which is 161h x 257w x 216d up to 966h x 1521w x 410d with any number of sizes in between, and again any number of shelves, dividers, spaces between. Each assembly could have rubber matting to each tray and/or a plinth rail. Common sense has to come into play when considering the infinite number of combinations possible, but even so the amount of combinations is still extremely high.

5. What other benefits does using DriveWorksXpress bring? Time, de-skill, consistency, new opportunities. The main benefit of being able to capture and re-use product knowledge is time saving, but there are the added advantages of having less skilled engineers being able to produce new specifications of existing components and assemblies, the drawings that are produced have the views that enforce the standard design practice applicable to the company, and as a consequence of these advantages the skilled engineers can then concentrate on new product development which drives the company forward and increases the amount of products available in DriveWorks Xpress.

Power Transformers

Comtrafo designs and manufactures power transformers and distribution transformers for the Brazilian and external markets. DriveWorksXpress has helped Comtrafo to reduce their design process from 1 week to just 4 hours. Located in Cornélio Procópio-PR, Brazil, Comtrafo have been using SolidWorks since 2008 and DriveWorksXpress from 2009.

Raphael Minato – Engineering Supervisor Comtrafo talks about productivity gains using DriveWorksXpress.

1. Time spent setting up - 3 months 2 weeks

"During this period over 560 rules were entered in order to allow a large number of pad-mounted transformer variations.”

2. Time spent before SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress – 1 week.

“An electrical transformer design has unlimited possibilities related to specific customer needs. The design of a pad-mounted transformer, with considerable complexity, if started from zero, used to take one week of work.”

3. Time taken with SolidWorks and DriveWorksXpress – 4 hours.

"It takes about 20 minutes to design with DriveWorksXpress and another 3 to 4 hours to finish some other customizations to meet customer specific needs if the design project has additional complexity.

4. How many possible variations could be produced of this assembly – 288 variations.

"Basically the variations are unlimited as each millimetre added generates a new product in the output. Taking in consideration only the usual patterns, 288 variations are possible.

5. How would you describe your experience using DriveWorksXpress?

“DriveWorksXpress is an easy to use tool that uses excel syntax for building rules therefore making it possible to automate lots of design work. A designer with good knowledge of the product to be manufactured and excel can get a great job done with DriveWorksXpress.”

6. Have you shared your work with colleagues?

“All the engineering department helped. Everything was done to meet the department needs.”

7. Will you be adding more products and rules?

“Everyday customers come up with a new idea or need so the creation of rules and automatization will always follow next in order to speed up this product manufacturing. Besides the pad-mounted transformer, 6 other products will be automatized.”