Essentials Course.book

Lesson 2
Introduction to Sketching
SolidWorks 2006 Training Manual
Where to Find It
Note
You must select a reference plane or a planar face of the model after
clicking Insert, Sketch. The cursor appears indicating that you
should select a face or plane.
You can access the Insert Sketch command in several ways.
■ On the Sketch toolbar click the tool.
■ Or, on the Insert menu, click Sketch.
■ Or, with the cursor positioned over a planar face or plane of the
model, right-click and choose Insert Sketch from shortcut menu.
3 Open a new sketch.
Open the sketch by either
clicking or choosing
Sketch from the Insert
menu. This will show all
three default planes for
selection in a Trimetric
orientation. A Trimetric
orientation is a pictorial
view that is oriented so the
three mutually
perpendicular planes appear
unequally foreshortened.
From the screen, choose the Front Plane. The plane will highlight
and rotate.
The Reference Triad (lower left corner) shows the orientation
of the model coordinate axes (red-X, green-Y and blue-Z) at all
times. It can help show how the view orientation has been
changed relative to the Front Plane.
Pre-Release
Do not copy or distribute
4 Sketch active.
The selected Front Plane
rotates so it is parallel to the
screen. This only happens for the
first sketch in a part.
The symbol represents the
part’s model origin which is the
intersection of the X, Y, and Z
axes. It is displayed in the color red, indicating that it is active.
Introducing:
Confirmation Corner
When many SolidWorks commands are active, a symbol or a set of
symbols appears in the upper right corner of the graphics area. This
area is called the Confirmation Corner.
24 Sketching