Hey Everyone, been doing a ton of research over the past few weeks on adding hydraulics to my Solidworks assemblies. Right now I don't do a ton of work but I have a few projects coming down the line that will require some hydraulic components. I'm thinking a mixture of 30 flexible rubbers hoses and hard line tubes, 60 fittings, a few cylinders, a valve bank and support equipment like hose clamps etc for each project.

I'm thinking I could go about this two ways, add in my cylinders, valve's, fittings and etc. all into my assembly, and then use 3d sketches and sweeps to model hoses between the components. I figure that this would be the easiest way.

I could also take the time to create a proper routing library with hose models and routing points added to my fittings and valves. I like this option because I know I will be using the same components and hoses on different projects.

My questions are:

How do others handle hydraulics in solidworks assemblies?

How do I go about setting up hoses models in routing, I started to follow the help guide and created a hose with a linked design table for the sizes (-12, -16, -24 etc.) is this the best way?

Will I be able to determine my hose lengths using routing?

Any tips and tricks or guides?

I have come across posts about using solidworks electrical for hydraulic and pneumatics, is this worth the cost and time of buying another piece of software?

Thanks for you help and forgive me if any of my terminology is off.