Blog SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 7 – Weldments
In this section, we're going to cover how costing handles SOLIDWORKS Weldments. As mentioned previously, Weldments include multi-body and single body structural members. Just like any other type of design, whenever you change any of it, you can see the new and updated cost along with a detailed cost breakdown of the Weldment design.
Even with Weldments, the costing tool will calculate Weldment members as extruded parts, so it's practical to start out with templates specific for the evaluation. Single body Weldments (meaning structural members) use the machining templates. Multibody Weldments use a multibody template.
The templates allow you to specify information such as the Standard, Profile, Size, and Stock lengths of the members. The Material cost is based on the Class and Name combination, but you can also override this. Please note that the override only affects the part that is open and not the template. All overrides will appear in yellow.
The Stock Body is critical because it determines the types of machining operations used to remove material from parts. With that, you can specify the cost Per length or Per stock length for the method to be used. Quantities can be set by Total number of parts and Lot size.
There is also a method of setting a Labor Cost, which allows you to set a cost of all manufacturing operations regardless of what machine is used. You can also take it a step further by adjusting the total cost or under Labor Cost, Weld Method, etc.
Cost Manager for Weldments
Within the Cost Manager for Weldments, you'll have a Setup folder. For most shops, each operation to manufacture the part requires setup costs, which usually depends on the time spent to set the part on their machines. That can be captured in the machining template, thus in turn is recognized by the Costing tool.
It would be practical to contain all set-up features within their own folder structure under a Setup folder, and list them under names such as Operations Setup or even Custom Setup. This is where you can group all the milling, drilling, and cutting setup costs. For example, if you had a tube that needed a miter cut, the cut would go into an operations folder while the setup would go into a setup folder. If 2 or more features share the same operation direction, such as a slot or a hole on the same face of a tube, those would be in the same operation folder.
The Custom Operations folder contains any operations that are not automatically recognized by the Costing tool. For parts that are being painted, you can assign a cost to paint the entire part or specific faces of a part. These operations can be added within the template and applied manually or automatically. You can also include Library Features and include their costs per feature by defining them in the template. Those will also have their own folder as well.
The folder labeled No Cost Assigned contains features that:
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are not recognized by the Costing tool
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are not defined in the template
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have a zero cost
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you excluded from the cost analysis
You can also create custom operations by clicking Add Custom Operation in the Costing Manager, and set a cost based on items such as Weight, Stroke, Time Duration, etc.
We hope that Part 7 of this series gives you an understanding of how to use the SOLIDWORKS Weldments costing tool to evaluate your part cost. Please check back to the CATI Blog as the Dedicated Support Team will continue to break down each of the functions in the SOLIDWORKS Costing Tool. All of these articles will be stored in the category of Daily Dose…..of SOLIDWORKS Support and links to each article with their release date are listed below:
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 1 – Overview (Bryan Pawlak 6/23/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 2 – How Costing Works (John Van Engen 6/24/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 3 – Options (Blake Cokinis 6/25/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 4 – Templates (Bob McGaughey 6/26/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 5 – Task Pane, Manager, & Sensors (Neil Bucalo 6/29/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 6 – Sheet Metal Costing (Bryan Pawlak 7/29/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 7 – Weldment Costing (George Brañes 7/30/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 8 – Machining Costing (John Van Engen 8/3/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 9 – Multi-body Costing (Blake Cokinis 8/4/15)
- SOLIDWORKS Costing an in-depth Review Part 10 – Reports, AddingRemoving Info, Limited Access Templates (Neil Bucalo 8/5/15)
George Brañes, Support Engineer
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