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Translating STEP in SolidWorks 2017 (or any year for that matter)

Question asked by Colby Putnam on Feb 23, 2018
Latest reply on Feb 23, 2018 by Ken Maren

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Hey all,

I have been a designer/detailer for about 3 years now and have had to do minimal STEP translating. And by this i mean the file I have translated are very small and have never had an issue. Recently we have been doing jobs requiring for us to translate a extremely large files (1,507,648 Kb to be exact).

My question is this. Is there any ways or pro tips on translating such large files faster/more efficient? The current file has been translating for 4 hours and even then it is not gaurnteed to complete without crashing. Looking for some input. Maybe im just dead in the water with such large files haha.

Thanks in advance!

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Ken Maren Feb 23, 2018 1:11 PM

Colby,

There isn't anything SolidWorks is going to do to speed this up. The issue here would be cleaning up the file before making the STEP. Also, break it into smaller chunks. If this is a large assembly, export every sub-assembly from the large assembly, if possible. This might give it the same coordinate system. That way when you bring it all together in SW, the subs go where they belong. I would be really surprised and impressed if your STEP made it all the way through.

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Colby Putnam @ Ken Maren on Feb 23, 2018 1:34 PM

Ken,

Thanks for the quick response. I guess i should have been a little more descriptive in my question. We receive STEP files from our customer and are required to translate them into SolidWorks so that we can work our design around them. This is why I was wondering if there was a way or tip on bettering my experience with this. i didn't think that there was a way around the speed with the size of the file. The thing to do would be to let our customer know what exactly they are sending us which we have done. But they don't care so i'm out of luck haha!

Again thanks for the input! appreciate the quick response!

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Ken Maren @ Colby Putnam on Feb 23, 2018 1:54 PM

Glad to see you got it translated. There is a CAD guy on your customer side that thinks it's funny to send you a STEP file of that size. You need to find someone there that you can bribe with beer to take out all the hardware, internal components and other stuff you don't need to see to accommodate your design. I see overnight translations in your future.

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Paul Salvador Feb 23, 2018 1:27 PM

Hello Colby,.. yeah, that's a biggie.. not sure if it will speed it up much but.. you could try and set your STEP Options per the attached image... and note,.. do not check "perform full entity check".

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Colby Putnam @ Paul Salvador on Feb 23, 2018 1:34 PM

Paul,

I am going to give these settings a shot one i am complete with the current translation.

Update after 6.5hrs.....The STEP file has translated. But i have lost almost a day with it so if anything speeds up large step files i will try it!

Thanks guys.

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Paul Salvador @ Colby Putnam on Feb 23, 2018 1:45 PM

Hey Colby... I would only add... since it is big.. and it is at risk of failure... if you have a few idle computers (say 3)... run it overnight or over the weekend on all 3?

good luck!...

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6 Replies

Ken Maren Feb 23, 2018 1:11 PM
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Colby,

There isn't anything SolidWorks is going to do to speed this up. The issue here would be cleaning up the file before making the STEP. Also, break it into smaller chunks. If this is a large assembly, export every sub-assembly from the large assembly, if possible. This might give it the same coordinate system. That way when you bring it all together in SW, the subs go where they belong. I would be really surprised and impressed if your STEP made it all the way through.
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- Colby Putnam @ Ken Maren on Feb 23, 2018 1:34 PM
  Mark Correct
  Correct Answer
  Ken,
  
  Thanks for the quick response. I guess i should have been a little more descriptive in my question. We receive STEP files from our customer and are required to translate them into SolidWorks so that we can work our design around them. This is why I was wondering if there was a way or tip on bettering my experience with this. i didn't think that there was a way around the speed with the size of the file. The thing to do would be to let our customer know what exactly they are sending us which we have done. But they don't care so i'm out of luck haha!
  
  Again thanks for the input! appreciate the quick response!
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  - Ken Maren @ Colby Putnam on Feb 23, 2018 1:54 PM
    Mark Correct
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    Glad to see you got it translated. There is a CAD guy on your customer side that thinks it's funny to send you a STEP file of that size. You need to find someone there that you can bribe with beer to take out all the hardware, internal components and other stuff you don't need to see to accommodate your design. I see overnight translations in your future.
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Paul Salvador Feb 23, 2018 1:27 PM
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Correct Answer
Hello Colby,.. yeah, that's a biggie.. not sure if it will speed it up much but.. you could try and set your STEP Options per the attached image... and note,.. do not check "perform full entity check".
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- Colby Putnam @ Paul Salvador on Feb 23, 2018 1:34 PM
  Mark Correct
  Correct Answer
  Paul,
  
  I am going to give these settings a shot one i am complete with the current translation.
  
  Update after 6.5hrs.....The STEP file has translated. But i have lost almost a day with it so if anything speeds up large step files i will try it!
  
  Thanks guys.
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  - Paul Salvador @ Colby Putnam on Feb 23, 2018 1:45 PM
    Mark Correct
    Correct Answer
    Hey Colby... I would only add... since it is big.. and it is at risk of failure... if you have a few idle computers (say 3)... run it overnight or over the weekend on all 3?
    good luck!...
    Like • Show 0 Likes0
    Actions

Translating STEP in SolidWorks 2017 (or any year for that matter)

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