Rhino & SW 2007

[mreader]

I'm looking for feedback on those of you that may do work in both Rhino & SW 2007. How well do they work together now? Any opinion on wether the two will create a closer relationship in the future? To me it looks as if SW may be possibly creating a relationship with Rhino to counter Autodesk's acquisition of Alias a while back. Thoughts?

Thanks!
Mark

 

[Theophilus]

That would be cool to see. I know a lot of good industrial designers who use Rhino to create quick curvy stuff, but almost everything must be redone within SW (which is what I get paid to do in these cases) because of the crazy geometry exported by Rhino (circles as two splines--why not just use a single closed arc?).

I've not worked with anyone using Rhino recently, so I don't have any other input--but I'd be interested in seeing if your theory proves correct. The ID tools recently improved within SW in the last three releases have been great (surface creation, filling, tangency, curvature, etc.), and rendering looks like it may be getting stronger beyond 2007 with whatever SW is doing with Maxwell.

Whatever the future, it looks fun.



Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

Reason trumps all. And awe transcends reason.

 

[Heckler]

Our graphics department uses Rhino to create our product manuals because it's cheaper then a seat of SWx. And since they do no real design it makes no sense that they use SWx. But I just downloaded Alibre Designs free version and am interested in how it functions.

http://www.deskeng.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=1458

I could create some competition for SWx & SE

Best Regards,

Heckler
Sr. Mechanical Engineer
SW2007 SP 2.0 & Pro/E 2001
Dell Precision 370
P4 3.6 GHz, 1GB RAM
XP Pro SP2.0
NVIDIA Quadro FX 1400
o
_`\(,_
(_)/ (_)

Never argue with an idiot. They'll bring you down to their level and beat you with experience every time.

 

[rockguy]

SW 2007 does have a Rhino plug-in which is suppose to aid in the use of Rhino with SW.

Rob Rodriguez CSWP
President: Northern Vermont
SolidWorks User Group

http://www.robrodriguez.com

http://designsmarter.typepad.com/rob_rodriguez/

SW 2007 SP 2.0

 

[roguewrench]

We have an ID who uses Rhino, the one issue we come across is the 2D sketches and most of the 3D models come in as splines when there created with lines and arcs. It becomes frustrating when you need a quick turn job.

CJ Goodrich
Product Design Engineer
Leatherman Tool Group
Portland, Oregon

 

[mreader]

It's the plug-in that provoked my "theory". I don't have Rhino to verify but it appears to me that the 'import' from Rhino can be treated somewhat as a SW feature. I don't know the specifics but from what I understand you can import from Rhino to SW, go back to Rhino, edit, and then replace the import into the SW file. Like I said, I'm not sure of all the ins and outs but it looks like there has been some ground work laid out for further integration of the 2 packages. As an example: the import to Rhino plug-in is set to on as default. May mean nothing but I found it curious.
I would really welcome such a relationship. A recent project had me using a different package (Concepts Unlimited) to explore concepts, with surfaces, to make the "shell" of the part and then import to SW to add inner features and so on. It was pretty cumbersome to make a change and then recreate the SW model time after time. I ended up recreating it complete in SW once I had found the shapes I was looking for. While SW was able to create it I doubt I would have had the same results if I used SW exclusively. It's just not that good for exploring ideas, but works well if you already know what it is you want to model.
So please let me know if anyone has both and can test the functionality of the two packages together. It's obviously far from seamless but may very well be a functional solution.

Mark

 

[rockguy]

You can download a trial of Rhino. The trial lasts for ever, the only limitation is 25 saves. This should allow you to play with the two together and answer your questions.

Rob Rodriguez CSWP
President: Northern Vermont
SolidWorks User Group

http://www.robrodriguez.com

http://designsmarter.typepad.com/rob_rodriguez/

SW 2007 SP 2.0

 

[bluesman0007]

Heckler,

Would be interested in what you think of Alibre. It's been a couple years since I worked with it and was really impressed what it did for the price. If my company wasn't footing the bill for SW I would be using it today.

Dennis

SolidWorks 2007 SP2.0
Windows XP Pro, Pentium4 3.00GHz
1.5 GB RAM, Matrox P650
Logitech Marble Mouse, CadMan

 

[roguewrench]

The Import part becomes a SW part in an essence. If you use any of the faces, planes ect for the import upon replacement to the updated import you will get invalided feature for with in solidworks.

I have done this same approach with ProE files which reeked havoc on my models we (re)importing new models.


CJ Goodrich
Product Design Engineer
Leatherman Tool Group
Portland, Oregon