REL 2024.3 / BUILD 18922

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Module 03 / Drawing workbench

GD&T drawings checked against ASME Y14.5 and ISO 128 before they leave your desk.

The Drawing workbench is GD&T drawing software built into every seat. Views, dimensions and feature-control frames stay associative to the 3D model, sheets follow ISO 128 or ASME Y14.5-2018 by template, and output goes to PDF/A-2 and DXF. Included in Standard at $2,490 one-time per seat.

Request a trial See the symbol table
Feature-control frames / Rev C cloud A printed drawing sheet showing GD&T symbols and a revision cloud
Fig. 01Revision clouds are drawn by the revision table, not by hand. Close the revision and the cloud goes with it.

03.1GD&T

The fourteen geometric characteristics and how each one is checked

The frame builder only offers the modifiers the selected standard allows on that characteristic. Put a maximum material modifier on a profile tolerance under Y14.5 and the OK button stays grey.

GD&T / 14 SYMBOLSASME Y14.5-2018 · ISO 1101:2017

Characteristic, glyph, datum use and modifiers accepted by the frame builder
TypeCharacteristicGlyphDatumMMC / LMC
FormStraightness⏤NoAxis only
FormFlatness⏥NoNo
FormCircularity○NoNo
FormCylindricity⌭NoNo
ProfileProfile of a line⌒OptionalNo
ProfileProfile of a surface⌓OptionalNo
OrientationAngularity∠RequiredSize features
OrientationPerpendicularity⟂RequiredSize features
OrientationParallelism∥RequiredSize features
LocationPosition⌖Required*Yes
LocationConcentricity◎RequiredISO only
LocationSymmetry⌯RequiredISO only
RunoutCircular runout↗RequiredNo
RunoutTotal runout⌰RequiredNo

* Position without datums is permitted for patterns located to each other.Concentricity and symmetry were removed from Y14.5-2018; the builder warns and offers position or profile.

03.2Sheet standards

ISO 128 or ASME Y14.5, picked once per template

The standard is a property of the sheet template, not a setting you remember to flip. It decides projection angle, line weights, arrowheads, text height, how a datum feature symbol is drawn and whether the builder accepts concentricity at all.

  • ISO 128 / ISO 1101. First-angle projection, 0.35 mm and 0.7 mm line pair, 3.5 mm text, filled datum triangle, millimetres with comma decimal optional.
  • ASME Y14.5-2018 / Y14.2. Third-angle projection, 0.3 mm and 0.6 mm line pair, 0.12 in text, inches or millimetres, leading zero suppressed on inch values only.

Mixed shops are common. A US customer machining for a German OEM keeps two templates and the part number prefix picks one. What we see go wrong most often is a template copied from an old DWG with the wrong projection symbol in the title block. The sheet check flags a projection symbol that disagrees with the view layout before export.

Views and dimensions

Standard, projected, auxiliary, section (full, half, offset, aligned), broken-out, detail and crop views. Dimensions pulled from model features stay driving, so a changed bore on the model moves the dimension text and keeps its tolerance class. Hole callouts read thread data straight from the hole feature: M8×1.25 - 6H ↧ 16 is never typed by hand.

03.3Title blocks

Three title-block sizes ship. Yours imports from DXF.

Fields are bound to model properties: part number, material, mass, drawn-by, checked-by. Nobody retypes a material name on the sheet.

TEMPLATES / 3 SIZESSHIPPED IN INSTALLER

TemplateSheetBlockStandardBound fields
A3 landscape420 × 297 mm180 × 56 mmISO 720018
A1 landscape841 × 594 mm180 × 72 mmISO 720022
ANSI D34 × 22 in6.25 × 2.75 inASME Y14.122

Revision tables

The revision table lives in the drawing, reads the revision letter from the model's property set and writes three things when you release: a row with zone, description, date and approver; a cloud around every changed dimension; a delta triangle with the letter. Revisions run A to Y, then AA, and skip I, O, Q, S, X and Z per Y14.35. When your PDM, via the REST adapter, owns the letter instead, the table reads it from there and stops incrementing on its own.

Drawings export to PDF/A-2 with embedded fonts, DXF R2018 and DWG R2018. Bills of materials export to CSV with a column map you save once. Large drawings of the assemblies on the Assembly page get balloons that follow the BOM order automatically.

A dual-monitor desk with a drawing sheet open on the second screen
Fig. 02Drawing on the second screen, model on the first. A change on either updates both within the same rebuild.

The checker would not let me put a modifier where the standard does not allow one. That alone cut two rounds from our supplier reviews.

Quality engineer, precision machining customer

03.4Price

Drawings are in every seat

LIST PRICE / USDINQUIRY ONLY

Standard perpetual seat, Drawing included
$2,490
Maintenance year, per seat
$590
Educational seat, watermark on exports
$0

No separate detailing licence, no viewer-only seat to buy for the checker: sws-view is free and opens drawings read-only with measure and markup. Full terms on Pricing

03.5Getting your sheets set up

From trial key to a released drawing

  1. 01

    Ask for the trial

    Installer and 30-day key by email within one business day. All three templates are in the box.

    DAY 0–1

  2. 02

    Import your title block

    Send us the DXF if you want it done for you. Support maps the fields and returns a template, free during the trial.

    DAY 2–5

  3. 03

    Detail one real part

    Pick a part your quality team knows well. Release it, run the sheet check, compare the PDF against the one you sent out last year.

    WEEK 2

  4. 04

    Quote and buy

    Perpetual seats, priced in USD, invoiced. No cart and no stored card.

    BY DAY 30

03.6Questions

Detailing questions we get every week

Not for architectural or electrical schematics. This is a mechanical drawing tool.

Can I bring my existing title block across?

Yes, from DXF. The geometry imports as-is and you map the text fields to model properties once.

Does it check my GD&T for errors?

It checks syntax against the selected standard: missing datums, modifiers not allowed on a characteristic, references to datums that do not exist on the sheet. It does not judge whether your tolerance scheme is functionally right. That is still an engineer's call.

Is there model-based definition without drawings?

PMI annotations export with STEP AP242. A full MBD workflow with no sheet at all is not where most of our customers are, and the drawing remains the primary output.

Will old SolidWorks or Inventor drawings open?

As DWG or DXF, yes, as dumb geometry. They do not become associative. For a SolidWorks alternative that is the honest answer: redraw active parts from the imported model, archive the rest as PDF.

Next

Detail one of your own parts before you pay for anything.

Sheet-metal flat patterns go onto these same sheets; see Sheet metal. The model side is on Part modelling and Assembly.

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