CAD Forum

We attempt to use edrawings. But with large assemblies it's terrible. Takes forever to save a project. Sometimes it crashes before finishing. And when it does, often times there are items missing in the edrawing. Sometimes measure works, sometimes it does not.

Is there another product that's good for large assemblies?

I would say XVL from lattice technologies but it takes quite some money and effort to make it works...

https://www.lattice3d.com/

it is a defacto toyota tool.

they use to scale the LOD of 3d data up to your acceptable error to make realtime lightweight models.
with 3d reporter tool (free reader available) you can embed XVL 3d inside an excel file and link the bom inside the 3D to the excel table so you get highlighted selected items in both 3d and the table.

https://www.lattice3d.com/products/lattice3d-reporter

JT, edrawings or other tessallated data are not able to scale LOD realtime, but have to save fixed LOD models Inside the exported file ar the expense of file size and performance.

or main problem with regard to SW is 2D is too slow and we reached the level it is impossible to work with resolved 2d data when gimmik like detailing mode reach their limits.

We actually have a SolidWorks licence dedicated specifically for our shop because eDrawings was too much of a pain and we didn't find anything that would do what we required.

Has anyone tried Glovius? Looks good in demo, but that is always a part or small assembly. $299-$399 / year.

https://www.glovius.com/products/

Hmm edrawing works pretty well on my end..

Do you know you do not really need to save into edrawing to view the file in edrawing?
Edrawing will read the graphic cache of the solidworks file... basically the file when you last saved.

You dont even need the entire pack and go assembly either...
You can pass someone only the asm file without all the child parts and it should still be able to open in edrawing...

Try saving assembly as 3DXML and then use D.S. 3DXML viewer... it's a free download from Dassault site

@GrahamK When I use 3DXML viewer, the original y-up view of SolidWorks is changed to z-up orientation, and everything is turned sideways up. How does your 3DXML perform in this?

@Frank_Oostendorp Mine does the same, never really bothered me as it's just a viewer which we can convey the design intent to our colleagues in other parts of the world.

(it's been years ago but) The one viewer which I really thought was impressive was Kisters -
https://viewer.kisters.de/en/products/3 ... rsion.html

3D PDF?

I have to add that Autodesk Navisworks is amazing for viewing large assemblies. Coming from edrawings and Solidworks there are some thing to learn. There is a free viewer (Navisworks Freedom), but someone needs the paid Nasvisworks Manage license (a couple thousand a year), to make the files for viewing. Can combine CAD from multiple sources.

The measurement leaves something to be desired. But the viewing, sectioning, hiding tools are there once you learn them.

You can view a whole building with a machine inside it no problem, opens very fast (faster than eDrawings).