Hole Wizard Pre-Selection Versus Post-Selection
There are two ways to use the Hole Wizard in SolidWorks. You can either select the plane or face to create the hole on before or after you select the Hole Wizard command. (Click the Hole Wizard icon from the "Features" toolbar, or pull down the “Insert” menu and pick Features – Hole – Wizard).

What's the difference? A 2D sketch is created when you pre-select a planar face for the Hole Wizard. A 3D sketch is created if you first click Hole Wizard and then select a face. To help understand what this really means, take a look at the simple L Bracket below. For the 1/4" diameter hole on the left, the left side of the part was selected as the planar face to create the hole on (pre-selected), and then the Hole Wizard command was picked. For the 1/4" diameter hole on the right, the Hole Wizard command was picked and then hole location was defined (post-selected). Both holes were dimensioned .50 from the side of the part and 1.00 from the bottom of the part. Note the difference in the screen captures below.

For the L Bracket, a 2D sketch is desired to get the distance from the bottom of the part to the center of the hole. The 3D sketch actually dimensioned from the edge line of the part to the center of the hole, causing an inaccurate dimension (the direct vertical distance is actually .9798). If you would like to use a 2D sketch, which would dimension to the projection of the edge instead of the actual edge, you just need to select a face before selecting the Hole Wizard command.

(April 20, 2006)

Home | About | Contact Us | Privacy Policy | Return Policy | Site Terms
All About Community | All About AutoCAD | All About Inventor | All About Solid Edge | About SolidWorks | Sheet Metal Guy
Copyright 2008 Sheet Metal Guy | info@SheetMetalGuy.com