Study Flashcards to Pass CSWP

Resources used: Gabriel Corbett's Linkedin Learning CSWP course, MySolidWorks CSWP Exam Prep Course,
Model Mania, CSWP Sample Exercises, nearly a hundred YouTube videos.

Author: Rafael Testai - Passed CSWP with 100%

Mechanical Designer of Medical Devices &
Consumer Products
FLASHCARDS SPONSORED BY: Pipeline Design & Engineering. We partner with medical device
engineering teams who need turnkey equipment such as cycle test machines, custom test fixtures, or
automation equipment but don’t have the bandwidth or resources internally to develop that equipment.
You can find us on the web at teampipeline.us . Examples of our fixtures below:
 Link to “Share”
Flashcards on social media

https://tinyurl.com/yac2vzbc
• Why we made these flashcards: The best way to improve memory is active recall, spaced learning and repetition.
Taking the CSWP courses is effective. But flashcards forcing you to recall the info you learned in the CSWP courses
is the optimal study method. We want more people to master SolidWorks so we can grow as a community.

• How to use these flashcards: Take any moment you’re free to study on the go.
Use the “Google Slides” app in your mobile phone. It’s free.

• Key: This is the key to understanding my notes:

Q = Question
A = Answer
Cont = Continuation. It’s a question that I further ask to dig deeper after a listed answer.
Red background = Got it wrong. Need to further review.
Yellow background = Crucial to understand
Some slides are labeled “tips” to remember. They aren’t questions.

• How you can thank me if you found my flashcards useful: (It’s important to give thanks 🙂)
“Share” this link: https://tinyurl.com/yac2vzbc to the flashcards on social media.
Send us a message on Linkedin, I’d love to hear from you.
CSWP tips:
1)Set material before starting
2)Set units.
3)Set variables
CSWP Shell feature edit
CSWP: How to make sub assy flexible <> rigid
Q:
A
Q: VERY USEFUL TO REMOVE THE FAT:
What’s another, cleaner, more efficient way to “cut” the excess materials off on
the sides of the part, WITHOUT having to create this sketch (pic 1) that goes
around the contour of the part?
Tip: You won’t have to create ANY new sketches to make the desired cut.
A: “Flip side to cut” selection under “cut extrude”
Flien
Fli
Q1: How do you get this “tile view”?
Q2: What does the “tile view” allow you to do? (benefits, other than
seeing all parts at once)
A1:
Q: Your sketch may be fully defined, black.
But what’s the basic rule of thumb to know if you have to many
dimensions?
A: If you have THE SAME dimension called out more than once,
it’s too many times.

Before After
Q: What do you have to select to generate this plane that cuts the
cube diagonally?
A: these 3 pts
Q: What feature do you use to go from A to B?
A: Swept cut
How do I make the two parts highlighted in blue become two
separate bodies? List all the feature I used and in which sequence
1) Created surface (red)

2) Used Split
A: Easy. It’s under “Surface bodies”
Q: Cont: How do you slice up or cut up the previous piece
into 4 different bodies?Below. Name feature and process.
A: Again, use “Split” feature and add the Right plane
Q: Which feature do you use to make this two independent
bodies?
A: Split. Use the sketch.
Key:Sketch, project.
A: Curves > Projected Curves
Q: When you import an scanned STL file into SW, you can’t select, reference, trace any of the geometry
on the body.
What do you need to do to this STL file so that you can
create an editable CAD shape from it?
Name the feature(s) you must use, how those features work, and sequence.

KW: GrabCad
A: 1)Slice (creates cross section sketch planes)
2) Then, Loft surface or Loft boss/base to create SW geometry.
Q: What are “Sketch blocks”?
When are they used?
What are the benefits?
How do you use them?
A: When are they used:
For sketches that need to be used repeatedly over muliple designs.
Benefits: you don’t have to dimension the sketches that make the BLOCK. Once you turn the sketch into a block, all
entities move as one that you can move around. You can simply “insert” the sketch block and scale, rotate it.
How to use sketch blocks: First make a sketch and save it as a “block.”
CONT next slide
Cont:
Layout sketches are great for rotation.
You can “Fix” one point and see how components roate around it.
Without having to spend time constraining anything.
Q: When do you create subassemblies and why?
A: #1)Create subassemblies when you’re going to combine the same
components repeatedly.
Therefore, create subassy and import it to topassy multiple times.
#2)Make subassys when in real life you would assemble ahead of time
and then installed into a bigger assy.
Q: What assembling/mating technique would you use to go from
A to B? Why?
A: Create subassy of each component so you don’t have to do all the mating individually
> Measure > linear pattern
Q: What 2 things does the path mate need in order to work?
A: A point on one part
A path on a diff part
Q: Does the path mate necessarily need a point made of a sketch?
A: No.
Q: How do you figure out how far along the path you are?
Yellow: path sketch
Green: Vertical trajectory

Key: Path mate

A: You can set it to a specific distance of percentage along the
sketch path
Q2: How do you solve it?

Loft
A: You must use the SPLIT ENTITIES to split the sketch and and add vertices to the sketch.
Q:
A: 3
Q: What feature do you used to achieve this?
A: Pattern > Instances to vary (check)
Q: Injection molding

Why is an uneven, non standard, core thickness not recommended

for injection molded parts?
A:
Cool unevenly, resulting in sink marks.

Differential shrinkage rate, bc part will have diff shrink rate bc of

different thickness sections. Part will go out of tolerance.
Q1: What is a mesh file? Define their characteristics.

Q2: What format do mesh files usually come in?

Q3: Why do mesh files exist?

Q4: Where do you find mesh files?

A1: A file with no volume. It’s not a solid.
You can’t use Boolena geometry features to edit STL file.
Cont: Define Boolean geometry.

A2: STL.
A3:
A4: GrabCad, etc.
A: Boolean geometics: intersection or overlaps of the solid models.
ADD, JOIN, SUBTRACT bodies.

So in relationship to prev Q, you can’t use operations to edit the

STL file like cut, boss extrude, etc. Need to convert STL mesh to
Q: What feature do you use to convert a surface body
to a solid body? A to B
A: Thicken.
Q1: What could make the “thicken” feature fail?
(Understand and describe the problem)

Q2: What can you do to overcome the problem?

A: The radius may cause “thicken” to fail.
Setting to get more precision in model:
Q: What feature do you use to go from A to B?
A:
Q: Name the feature & process
A:

Makes sense. You’re offsetting the surface by “0.”

Q: What feature combines several surfaces into one?
A: Knit Surfaces
Q: What feature do you use to patch this empty space?
A: Fill surface
Q: Recreate this star in SW.
List all features and sequence required to create it. If not listed all,
you failed.
A: The 3D Sketch is instrumental to create the vertices needed to generate the
surface using Fill Surface.
Q: What feature do you use to go from A to B?
A: Fill surface.
Q: How to go from A to B?
A: Thicken.
Q: How do you create this twisted trapezoidal shape? (Name feature)
(Simply rotated model, no changes in both pics)
A: Surface-Loft.
Q: What’s a common procedure (list the steps) for creating
thin walled bodies with custom curvature? (Basically, how would you make these blades?)
A:
Q: How to go from A to B?
A:

Replace face
Q: You have an imported “Graphics” file (has no feature tree, as you can see).
Therefore, you can’t “suppress” fillets bc there are no fillet features.
How do you convert some of the fillets to Straight hard edges on the file? (Go from A to B)
A: Delete face.
Q:
A: Combine > Subtract

Interestingly, the feature is called

“Combine” but you generally use it
To SUBTRACT bodies.
Q: What is a “mesh” file and why is it called that?
A:
Mesh file = STL file.

“Mesh” bc the file is covered in triangles (facets) without any

overlaps.

No representation of color or texture.

A: How do you import an STL part into SolidWorks?
Describe the process of importing STL part into SW.
A:

You have the option to import the STL file into SW as 3 diff types of bodies.
Cont:
1)Describe the benefits of each import and when to use each import.
2)Which import is the most popular and why?
A
Import Type Why & How to use Downsides

Surface Body Most popular import.

Try to rebuild part with lean surfaces

Solid Body SW attempts to fix any gaps in the surfaces. Memory

You HAVE to run import diagnostics intensive.
(memory intensive). Otherwise, only a
surface body will be created.

Graphics Body Lease popular import. No faces,

edges, or points
Only serves as visual reference
You may need to change the settings when importing STL files to SW

Options >
Import >
STL (Drop down) >
Solid, Surface, Graphics (select one)
Q: (Correction: “slicing” tool, not “split.”
A:

Key: make new planes, importing STL, mesh, loft, slicing

Q: What feature do I use to go from A to B?
A: Intersect.

You’re left with a single solid body that’s made by the

intersection of the two bodies.
Q: What feature do I used if I want to go from A to B and
NOT have to recreate the slot sketch feature at every instance?
A: Sketch driven pattern.
Q: I want to put the “=” and select a global variable I had created. But after I enter “=”
there is NO SELECTION to use the global variable. What’s a work around so that I can
ultimately end up using the Global Variable I had created for this thicken feature
dimension?
A: Key: Double click.
Q: You want to cut away the green geometry so it fits with a bracket.
You want clearance between the parts. What feature would you use?
A: Indent.

Key: subtract, Nest

Q: What’s the difference between
COMBINE>SUBTRACT bodies

Vs

INDENT > cut (check)

A:
Q: What single feature would I use to eliminate the organge
highlighted section? PS: I have two bodies, A & B.
A: Intersect.
Q:
A:
Q: You’ve built a part using convert entities (top down). But now you want to go
from A to B. Meaning, you want to break the in context external entities from the
green part so that you can resize the pink part. Explain how to go from A to B.
A:

External references, incontext references, top down

Q: Huge time saving tip.
A: This is huge when doing top down modeling and wanting to convert entities and
offset them.
Q: How do you know when top-down approach is NOT
A good option for your design? Explain why.
A: If the parts you’ll design will be used in OTHER models, the
top-down isn’t good option.

Because: When you edit the top-down model, it’s child parts will be
edited simultaneously. But then those child parts are used in
OTHER models that you may probably NOT want the child parts to
change. It would create a mess.

You don’t want a part that has external references placed inside
OTHER models.
Q: Top down:
A:
Q: What tool do you use to identify:
if, when, and where collisions between components will occur?
A: Move component>
Collision detection
Q: You’re building the item below. As you can see, it’s composed of several parts.

What’s the best way to put through all, threaded holes in the 3 highlighted green
sections below? Explain which approach you would take to create the holes and why that
approach.
A: A great approach to making threaded holes that go through all is to use the hole wizard feature
WITHIN THE ASSY, and select “propagate feature to parts” (checkbox).

This allows you to use the hole wizard feature ONE TIME and all the parts that fit together will have the threaded
hole.

It’s a good idea to leave the holes till the end

and do the Hole Wizard feature in the Assy once
all the parts are mated.
Q: What does the question mark mean?
Why is the question mark there?
How do you fix it?
A1: The part was created in an assy and it’s out of context.
A2: Bc the assy file where the design intent was created is currently NOT open at the
moment. You get rid of the question mark by simply opening the assy file the part was created
in.
Temporarily block changes betweeen the referenced components

How to permanetly break the external reference path?

Q: Top-down: External references.
“Lock all” vs “Break all”
Which one should you use nearly 100% of the time, and why?
A: Use “Lock all” nearly 100% of the time.

Once you “break all,” you can’t restore the external references.
They are perpetually broken.
Q: What is a flexible vs rigid sub assembly?
Explain what each term means, how and when to use each.
A: When you import a sub assembly into an assy,
The sub assy will be “rigid” by default. Meaning, it won’t have
motion.

If you want to the sub assy to move inside the assy, you need to
right click the sub assy and make it “flexible.”

It is rather recommended to use different configurations if you want

to show the assy in different configurations or views, rather than
having the sub assy as flexible.
Q: How do you set a distance mate that’s the distance between
the center of the peg, A, and the center of the curved cut out, B?
A: You have to turn on “view temporary axis”
Q: What do you call when you edit a part WITHIN an assy?
A: Edit in-context.
Q: Explain what’s a HYBRID assy modeling style and the
PROs of using it.
A:
Edit the parts you imported into the assy using “edit part” once they
are already mated in the assy.

Cont
Cont: What are the PROS of this hybrid assy modeling style?
A: When you create the separate files before you import them to
the assy, you don’t have to be as specific with their dimensions and
spend a lot of time collecting measurements to see how they’ll fit.
You’ll basically make the part with rough estimates of
dimensions, # of holes, etc.

Then, once you import that parts into the assy, you can begin
editing the parts within the assy (in context) so that they all fit with
one another.
Q: This is a part in an assy.
A:
The part is pink color at the assy level
The part is grey color at the part document level.
Q: How Come when I open this part at the part level, the pink color
is lost? How do I make it so that the pink color ALSO shows up at
the part level, not just the assy level?
A:
Tip: color
Q: CSWP: What should you do after you finish each part for each
question?
A: Save it like this
Q: How do I know if these 4 columns can slide through the 4 holes
of the pink part without any interference?
A: Interference detection.
Q:
A: Hashed.

Means you’re cutting through a solid.

Q: What is tolerance stack-up and what is it for?
A: To ensure all parts fit in assy.
Q: What does “nominal size” mean?
A: "Nominal" size is the base size to which tolerances are applied.

Cont: What does LMC & MMC stand for?

A:
LMC: Least material condition
MMC: Most material condition
Q:
A: The nominal size of the hole is 1.00,
with a tolerance of
Plus or minus, .01.
Q: CSWP: How to go from A to B?
A
Q: CSWP: You want to make a config that’s very close, aka has the
“starting config” as the one selected in gree. How do you do that?
A:
Q: CSWP: Coordinate system.
How do you create a coordinate system?
A: 1)Create an assembly from the part****
You can only create coordiate system in assy files,no part files.
Q: CSWP: How do I determine at what angle the two faces
(green) come in contact with each other?
A: Collision detection, stop at collision
Followed by manual measure tool
Q: CSWP: How do u determine how much volume two parts are
interfereing with each other?
A:
Q: CSWP: How do you override the values of mass and center of
mass of sub assy?
A: Just watch this video
Q: CSWP:
1) What is a “gear ratio”?
2) How do you set a gear ratio between the two “claw”
components?
A: Gear ratio: ratio between the rates at which the last and first gears rotate
CSWP TIP: sometimes you may need to offset entities of all edges
and then trim some edges to customize the offset of that specific
edge.
CSWP TiP: Make sure to have all construction lines, as indicated in
drawing, to ensure all dimensions are present.
Q: What do you call this feature?
A: Detent.
Tip: CSWP spit screen, best way
Q: When 3D printing parts, what should you watch out for when
using the “hole wizard”?
A: Hole wizard thinks that you’ll be using a drill bit to make the
holes. Cont:
Cont A:
Q: You’re making drawings, but...
A: You need to recreate a the PROPER views on the model file. But you only need to create
the “FONT” view, all the rest views will update on the drawing
More Resources to Pass CSWP:
-Joko Engineeringhelp Youtube channel.

-Model Mania 2009

FLASHCARDS SPONSORED BY: Pipeline Design & Engineering. We partner with medical device
engineering teams who need turnkey equipment such as cycle test machines, custom test fixtures, or
automation equipment but don’t have the bandwidth or resources internally to develop that equipment.
You can find us on the web at teampipeline.us . Examples of our fixtures below: