Onshape, a leading professional 3D CAD platform for Agile Product Design, introduces sheet metal design capabilities. The cloud-based design tools enable faster creation and refinement of sheet metal parts with simultaneous generation of editable, synchronized flat, folded and tabular views.

“This has been one of the most highly anticipated enhancements requested by our customers,” says Scott Harris, Onshape’s VP of Product Definition and User Experience. “We’re proud to be delivering new tools that you can’t find anywhere else in the CAD industry. Our team has completely rethought and re-engineered the way sheet metal parts are designed and prepared for manufacturing.”

Sheet metal professionals can speed up their design process in the following ways:

1. Simultaneous Sheet Metal Views: Unlike traditional desktop-installed CAD systems that force users to work in only one mode (flat, folded or tabular) at a time, Onshape shows all representations in one simultaneous view. When designers edit one view, the other two are synchronized automatically using Onshape’s full-cloud database architecture. Seeing the flat and folded views side-by-side lets users visualize errors and interferences immediately, consider alternatives and ultimately, reduce scrap and wasted time.
2. Editing Sheet Metal From a Bend Table View: The manufacturer can quickly change the parameters of a model in a bend table view – such as the radius or order of individual bends – while preserving the original design intent and seeing the impact immediately on the flat and folded views.

“Onshape’s Simultaneous Sheet Metal Views allow you to create your model easier with more flexibility,” adds Harris. “Part of the beauty here is that you can start down one path and if things aren’t right, you can just change it around without having to start over again. In fact, you can refactor your model by switching around rips and bends.”

“This is going to prevent a lot of headaches between designers and manufacturers, because almost all sheet metal work is done collaboratively. We created the system to allow designers to build in design intent and allow fabricators to adjust the model based on specific tooling, without violating the design intent,” he says.

The new precision sheet metal features, now concluding early visibility testing, will be made available to all Onshape users in a near-term release.

Onshape
onshape.com