Solidworks Roll Flat Sheet Metal

Consider a 3 foot diameter metal cylinder and how we could create this and create a flat patten using the sheet metal tools found in solidworks standard.

Solidworks roll flat sheet metal.

Sheet metal parts are generally used as enclosures for components or to provide support to other components. You can roll back all bends from a sheet metal part in which bends have been inserted so that you can make additions such as adding a wall. This can especially useful for locating and punching holes in the sheet. Solidworks sheet metal allows you to quickly and easily design folded or flat parts but what about parts that don t have simple straight bends.

Use line sketch l shape dimension sketch with smart dimension as 1in x 1in. As shown in the figure below the flat pattern view is the same as the front view and shows the part in a bent state. In this tutorials you will learn how to utilize sheetmetal tool such insert bend and flaten. There are some tips and tricks included.

You can design a sheet metal part on its own without any references to the parts it will enclose you can design the part in the context of an assembly that contains the enclosed components or you can design the part within another part document in a multibody environment. You can view how the corner treatment impacts the folded sheet metal body and how it carries over to the flat pattern. Search using sheet metal tools in the solidworks knowledge base. Once the holes are created the fold tool may be used to roll up the flat sheet.

The bonus to this method is that the solidworks rolled component can then be unrolled using the sheet metal unfold tool. When the flat pattern drawing view of a solidworks sheet metal part displays the part in the bent condition this can indicate an issue with the suppression state of the flat pattern feature. Make sure to grab a note pad and get ready for some quick modeling. I hope you like it.