Tutorials/books for Solidworks 2010

[AtvNut]

I am looking for some sort of book CD DVD etc to learn how to use Solidworks 2010 Does anyone have anything they would like to part with or can point me in the right direction it would be appreciated.

Thanks

[loose nut]

Solidworks books are available from many sources, even Barnes and Noble, check out the web.

http://www.techedu.com/SolidWorks_Books.asp

http://www.torrentdownloads.net/torrent/1652155369/SolidWorks+2010+-+No+Experience+Required+%5Bh33t%5D+%5Bmahasonaz%5D

If you don't have solidworks yet or are not committed to it but are just looking to learn cad then check out Autodesk Inventor (free 30 day trial download) it has a much better interface and is just as good, if not a more capable cad program.

Solidworks and Inventor are the two main competitors at the top of the second tier cad programs.

[AtvNut]

I already have solidworks

[loose nut]

Oh well, sorry. There are plenty of resources on the web. Tutorials, books and training material, most are free. Just do a search for what you are looking for.

[AtvNut]

Oh well, sorry. There are plenty of resources on the web. Tutorials, books and training material, most are free. Just do a search for what you are looking for.
Thank you very much you opened my eyes to something I usually complain about not using the web/google etc

[loose nut]

Seriously, take a look at Inventor.

[scmw]

ATVnut,

I have been working with SolidWorks 2010 Tutorial with Multiedia CD by David C. Planchard and Marie P. Planchard. This book contains several hundred pages plus the CD. It teaches you to build a robot with many parts and assemblies of many different geometries. I looked at many books on this application and found this to be one of the best. I paid around $40.00 plus shipping on Amazon.

While I'm certainly no expert on this application, I am much more comfortable working with it since picking up this book. The CD does a nice job of explaining and demonstrating the many principles of the program.

As for others saying to use this app instead of that app, etc, they don't always know the situation that leads one to use something else. Sometimes a job requires knowledge of SW over others. I use Rhino as my main app but a job that we took on required SW. I was in your shoes a few months ago.

Best of luck,

[AtvNut]

ATVnut,

I have been working with SolidWorks 2010 Tutorial with Multiedia CD by David C. Planchard and Marie P. Planchard. This book contains several hundred pages plus the CD. It teaches you to build a robot with many parts and assemblies of many different geometries. I looked at many books on this application and found this to be one of the best. I paid around $40.00 plus shipping on Amazon.

While I'm certainly no expert on this application, I am much more comfortable working with it since picking up this book. The CD does a nice job of explaining and demonstrating the many principles of the program.

As for others saying to use this app instead of that app, etc, they don't always know the situation that leads one to use something else. Sometimes a job requires knowledge of SW over others. I use Rhino as my main app but a job that we took on required SW. I was in your shoes a few months ago.

Best of luck,

Thanks for the input :) I will look into this book as soon as I find my gift card from Barnes and Noble UGH

[macona]

Solidworks books are available from many sources, even Barnes and Noble, check out the web.

http://www.techedu.com/SolidWorks_Books.asp

http://www.torrentdownloads.net/torrent/1652155369/SolidWorks+2010+-+No+Experience+Required+%5Bh33t%5D+%5Bmahasonaz%5D

If you don't have solidworks yet or are not committed to it but are just looking to learn cad then check out Autodesk Inventor (free 30 day trial download) it has a much better interface and is just as good, if not a more capable cad program.

Solidworks and Inventor are the two main competitors at the top of the second tier cad programs.

Ooo, I would have to disagree on that one. We use inventor at work and I am always banging my head on things I have no problem doing in solidworks. I have found a lot of their dialogs to be non-intuiative.

[loose nut]

True, if you are doing a specific job or work for a company that requires the use of a specific program then that is what you learn and use.

But if you are just going to learn 3D virtual modeling/prototyping then you can use any and it wouldn't hurt to check out several players in the field.

Both Solidworks and Inventor are about equal to each other, they play leapfrog with each other on new features, they probably use the same drawing engine (there aren't many to chose from) and have the same basic commands and functionality. They are both way to expensive. A prototype done in Solidworks will be very much the same as one done in Inventor.

I have used Inventor for many years, moving to it from Autocad and have seen many posts on it from members that seem to like it better then anything else so I decided to have a look and see what was so wonderful. After downloading a trial and having used it a bit I don't see what the fuss is about.
Many functions that I find easy in Inventor seem clumsy to me in Solidworks. The feature manager frequently has much of it hidden and must be opened and collapsed to get at the various box's, where Inventor has dialogue box's that open as necessary and only the commands and functions that can be used at any particular moment are normally visible which makes the screen/s tidier and less crowded. I will be the first to admit that Inventor has some "points" that can drive you to drink but every complex program does, even Solidworks, Alibre or Sketchup.

Everyone's experience with any given program, especially when they are this complex, is going to differ. Mine is probably tainted by the years of using Inventor compared to the little time spent on Solidworks where Macona prefers to use Solidworks. He finds Inventor to not be intuitive were I find the same thing about Solidworks. To each his own. I guess that is the point I am trying to make, if you aren't locked in to using a specific program then try several of them and compare (most have a free trial). It isn't necessary to pick the one that others like, you might find that a different one works better for you.

P.S. the one thing that all these programs have in common is that it is a lot easier to model something in 3D then it is to make it after you are done. Keep that in mind when you are designing something. Some poor slob has to build it, maybe you.