Convert SolidWorks models and drawings to Autodesk Inventor

[Anonymous]

Hello all!  My employer wishes to convert a library full of models and drawings (>1,000) from SolidWorks 2016 to Inventor 2016.

Are there any applications available for purchase that either Autodesk or a 3rd Party organization has developed that can convert SolidWorks files to Inventor files AND maintain sketches/colors/properties/etc...?

Here are the details...

1) There are currently two Departments that work on the same product line; however, one uses Inventor and the other uses SolidWorks.  The objective is to have both Departments use Autodesk Inventor and phase out the SolidWorks licensing.

2) We are interested in either a) Purchasing a tool to convert the files for us or b) Hiring an agency to re-make the models and drawings in Autodesk Inventor.

3) The models and drawings are custom-engineered (not standard, off-the-shelf components) and will need to be revised in the future, meaning that we have to keep as much functionality and underlying data as possible.

Here is what I know...

1) Simply importing a sldprt or sldasm file (or any other format such as stp, sat...) into Autodesk Inventor only results in a "dumb-model" with no sketches/dimensions, model-tree, or any other consumable meta-data.

2) I'm more concerned about the model integrity than the drawing integrity as the drawings will not need to be accessed until a revision occurs.

3) I've heard that AI 2017 has better import functionality, but I still doubt it achieves what we are looking for.

Thank you,

Tom Davidson

[mcgyvr]

Nope.. You will not be able to get a full history/feature tree..

I believe you will need to do your option of contracting it out (or doing that internally which will be cheaper assuming you have a body to put the time into it)

[Anonymous]

As mcgybr said, there is no software for this. If you find something, let me know as it would make my life easier 🙂

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the quick reply.  Are there any applications/tools that can convert the model and drawing files such that you are able to import the sketches and/or work planes?  My thought here is that if you had visibility to the sketches you could regenerate the solid.

Obviously, given the massive number of files that will need converted, being able to import the sketches with dimensions would be a tremendous start.

Thanks again! ~ Tom

[mdavis22569]

You can bring in the Solidworks file into Inventor ... either as a Solidworks file or left as the solid works file and make a new IDW...

Isn't that what AnyCad is suppose to do ... let you make a 3d model from another format, and let it stay native or save as an Inventor ipt/iam?

[Mark.Lancaster]

Yes the reference model option for AnyCAD will allow you to do that..  But as I review @Anonymous information it sounds like they really need to make modifications (revisions) to the model and/or drawings.  Going this route (dumb-solids) will force them to use direct-edit tools.

[mcgyvr · Accepted solution]

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@mdavis22569 wrote:

You can bring in the Solidworks file into Inventor ... either as a Solidworks file or left as the solid works file and make a new IDW...

Isn't that what AnyCad is suppose to do ... let you make a 3d model from another format, and let it stay native or save as an Inventor ipt/iam?

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But its either a reference to the original swx file or a dumb solid..

"Anycad" doesn't keep the existing model/feature tree intact.. 

And with the requirement to be able to make changes to the models in the future not having the feature tree complicates things..."some"..

Dumb solids are still editable in all ways but not as easy as doing it through the feature tree..

Personally if this was my issue I would ONLY remodel when needed and not do it across the board as there may be tons of files that never need to be edited in anyway so spending money on conversion is just a waste of time/money..

I'd probably just teach my guys how to edit the dumb solids vs even remodeling it..

[TheCADWhisperer]

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@Anonymous wrote:

...  My employer wishes to convert ... from SolidWorks 2016 to Inventor 2016.....

 ..

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I don't have Inventor 2016 on the machine where I am sitting at the moment, but I believe that you need Inventor 2017 to open SolidWorks 2016 files (SolidWorks file version +1) *.sldprt and *.sldasm

You are out of luck for drawing files *.slddrw

You might check out this company http://elysiuminc.com/  but I have no experience with this.

[smokes2998]

you mean something like this?

https://community.plm.automation.siemens.com/t5/Solid-Edge-Forum/SolidWorks-Associative-Drawing-Migr...

You need to put it on the ideas Station

[TheCADWhisperer]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Try this that guy converted me a soldwork part file to .step so i can open the file with inventor.

https://www.fiverr.com/kylehofer1/covert-sldprt-file-to-inventor?context=single_query&context_type=auto&context_referrer=search_gigs&ref_ctx_id=591e4d3c-9ab5-4590-b060-f1712f2837de&filtered_price=&pckg_id=1&pos=43&funnel=b2354164-f224-442c-aee3-b8e8d539f670

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Looks like an advertisement to me.

No 3rd party is required to convert SolidWorks part files to STEP.