I have been having an unusual issue lately. I like to model assemblies and components as multibody parts and if I need to, I export the solid bodies and make assemblies. Mostly I just leave as a multi body parts and document from there. The past week I have been having issues with dimensions from parts after placing into drawings with the Select Bodies button. Some edges will not let me place a smart dimension on; I have been forced to add a point and use that as my locator. I am running SW2022. Please note I have been doing this method of drawing and documenting for years, it is only very recently that I have been having an issue. Oddly it is not every selected body either just the occasional ones.
I have had this in the past where I was not able to select an edge. I don’t remember which version of SW that it was. Quite often it would be an edge that if all the parts in the multibody were visible that edge would have been hidden in that view. Can you select that edge if you set that view to Wire Frame Hidden Lines Visible? I had found that would work for me. Once the dimensions were all placed I could then set the view back to what I wanted. Sometimes saving the drawing and closing it would allow me to work on the view as normal the next time it was opened. Come to think of it I don’t remember the last time I had the issue so maybe it is not an issue in SW2024 SP5
On the drawing when I can’t get the edge that I need to put the dimension on there are a few things that I do.
open the part and rebuild it. Then go back to the drawing rebuild and sometimes that works.
Shut down SolidWorks and restart it.
Depending on how many models I have had open restart the computer.
The other thing that I would look for is that the graphics card driver is still approved. Sometimes windows or other computer updates will change the driver for you and it will cause the problems that you are seeing.
Restarting the computer has done the trick. I will look into that windows update. It has only been an issue recently. Good tip on the wire frame view trick, will try that if it happens again. Thanks for the advice, much appreciated.
I think this is the #1 computer repair fix. Previous job I had an issue with the computer program that we were using at the time. Had done everything I thought might fix it. Even restarted the computer several times. When I call our in house support person, the first thing he said was turn your computer off and restart it! I said I have done that several times. He says no, not restart, turn it off, wait 10-15 seconds then turn it back on. When we did that everything worked correctly!
In Windows 11, both shutdown and restart close running applications and processes, but restart performs a clean boot by resetting the kernel and clearing RAM, while shutdown utilizes Fast Startup, saving the kernel state for faster boot times. Restart is generally recommended for troubleshooting and applying updates, while shutdown is suitable for longer periods of inactivity.
I tend to reboot quite a bit. I reboot after every SW crash, so at a minimum a couple of times a week.
Can Fast Startup be disabled in Power Settings on Win11 or did they remove that option? That’s an item on my check list for every CAD workstation or our IT dept sets up. With the SSDs and powerful processors the time for full reboot is nearly insignificant compared to what it used to be.
If it is graphics related it seems that Windows just grabs the latest “stable” driver from nVidia on updates, I’ve found that we need to run slightly older driver version. Probably due to running an older version of Solidworks that isn’t 100% compatible with the latest graphics drivers.
I found that sometimes, transparency and tangent edges visibility are the cause for unselectable edges. Temporary making all lines visible in a drawing view including tangent edges solved the problems for us.
Not that this is an ideal workaround for you, but you have tried using combination of delete bodies and configurations so that each configuration represents one of the solid bodies. See if you still have issue selecting the edges you had issue when you used Select Bodies.
I reckon I’ve experienced this misbehaviour too. Mercifully, not often. I cannot help you with a cause. But I have had some success seleting the edges I want by using the “Select Other” option in the RMB Context menu. Maybe this can help you too.
I was working with a laptop at the time. Pulling the plug would not have done much. But, one time I taught the CEO of the company where I was working at the time, how to remove the battery from his laptop because the power button didn’t seem to do anything! We were a couple hundred miles apart so I have no idea what he was doing!
Save the 10-15 secs and switch off at the wall (unless you’re in the US then pull the plug.!) and push the start button a couple times.