Caprock conta os motivadores da decisão de trocar o SolidWorks pelo Solid Edge e como isso impacto na sua maneira de trabalho.

1. Solid Edge
Caprock Manufacturing
Contract manufacturer replaces SolidWorks with Solid Edge; cites need to simplify
design for manufacturing process and avoid potential modeling kernel change
Industry Complex CAD process calls
Utilities, energy, aerospace, for technology re-evaluation;
life sciences, transportation switch takes burden off
engineering team
Business challenges
Founded in 1983, Caprock Manufacturing
Growth strategies increased (Caprock) is a privately held custom manu-
demand on engineering facturer of plastic injection molded prod-
group ucts and assemblies for original equipment
Need to model design manufacturers (OEMs) in the medical,
recommendations for OEM utilities, transportation, energy and other
customer products faster industries. Vertically integrated services
Existing CAD system’s include product design, prototyping, mold
unknown future making and a wide range of finishing
processes. Caprock’s enclosures business
unit designs and manufactures casings for
Keys to Success airline signage, water meters, electrical
Re-evaluate existing enclosures, durable medical equipment
and other products. More demand on engineering group
SolidWorks CAD
Understanding its success in the market,
Find faster way to edit Caprock kept its focus on the design pro-
Caprock excels in early supplier involve-
customer data cess and, in 2011, decided to upgrade its
ment, a process in which it partners with
Move from complex history- customers during the product design computer-aided design (CAD) tools from
based modeling to period to ensure manufacturability, quality SolidWorks® software from Dassault
synchronous technology and cost effectiveness while keeping tool- Systemes SolidWorks Corporation to
ing lead-time to a minimum. This simpli- Solid Edge® software from Siemens PLM
fies the design process and has proven to Software. Caprock had used SolidWorks
Results for six or seven years, selecting it because
be much more efficient for all parties than
Five-fold decrease in customer the conventional customer approach of it was an industry trend.
design time bringing the job out for bid only after the
Avoided possible modeling design is finalized and then finding manu- “But we read press and blog posts that
kernel disruption facturability issues during the tooling SolidWorks was going to a new modeling
process. kernel and that prompted us to look at the
market,” says Joshua Walles, a senior
project engineer with Caprock.
www.siemens.com/solidedge

2. “We read press and blog
posts that SolidWorks was
going to a new modeling
kernel and that prompted
us to look at the market.”
Joshua Walles
Senior Project Engineer
Caprock Manufacturing
“Our concerns about the future of Time for a new CAD technology
SolidWorks actually led us to the discovery evaluation
of a major shift in CAD innovation and pro- Caprock performed a basic market search,
ductivity,” notes Walles. “The synchronous looking at its existing SolidWorks and
technology in Solid Edge proved to be the Pro/Engineer® software. “Initially, we were
answer to the increased demand here on leery of keeping SolidWorks, because of
our engineers.” the uncertainties in its future direction
and lack of new innovation in the past few
As a contract manufacturer, Caprock works releases,” says Walles.
with its customers to modify and redesign
parts for product manufacturability. Most That led Caprock to Solid Edge and the dis-
of the company’s engineers have no formal covery of an unexpected bonus in synchro-
CAD training and are dual-tasked with nous technology. Often, Caprock has only
project management duties. a paper drawing from its customers or
sometimes a dumb solids file. Walles
“We weren’t really entrenched in the points out that bringing in a dumb solid
complex design planning process using with SolidWorks would be just the same
SolidWorks,” says Walles. “The feature-tree as having a standard for the exchange of
parametric process has been a real time- product model data (STEP) equivalent:
consumer. We struggled with history- “I don’t have time to recreate all the
based modeling. It was like a tough chess features that require modification.”
game; you would have to look five, six,
seven, eight, ten moves ahead in the Editing CAD data with synchronous
future in order to get the design right.” technology became a key interest point
for Caprock. “What would take us several
“SolidWorks is not as evolved as Solid Edge hours to edit in SolidWorks takes us less
is,” says Walles. “Using SolidWorks, the than an hour using Solid Edge,” says
design is only as sound as the feature tree Walles.
is. If you discover a mistake made earlier,
in many cases just forget it, you might as
well start over.”

3. Solutions/Services Using Solid Edge, changes made by “Over a period of a year, I might have
Solid Edge with synchronous Caprock no longer require recreating the 20 customer redesign projects and would
technology feature tree. “With synchronous technol- have to start all over in about 10 of them
www.siemens.com/solidedge ogy, you just delete or modify the design using SolidWorks due to a combination of
feature and go,” says Walles. “That makes lack of familiarity and fighting with the
it a very forgiving design tool. The soft- design plan,” says Walles. “With Solid Edge
Customer’s primary business ware is more intuitive and we don’t have and synchronous technology, that rarely
Caprock manufactures to guess what the programmer’s intent happens. Yes, I would call Solid Edge and
products for the medical, was to use most common software its synchronous technology a break-
aerospace, utilities, transpor- features.” through – true innovation.”
tation, energy and other
industries. Caprock reports significant error
www.caprock-mfg.com reduction since moving from SolidWorks
to Solid Edge. “I need to draw as fast as
I think. The number of mistakes is much,
Customer location much less than it used to be,” says Walles.
Lubbock, Texas
United States
“SolidWorks is not as evolved
as Solid Edge is. Using
SolidWorks, the design is
only as sound as the feature
tree is. If you discover a mis-
take made earlier, in many
cases just forget it, you
might as well start over.”
Joshua Walles
Senior Project Engineer
Caprock Manufacturing
Siemens Industry Software
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