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Part Design

Feature-based solids with one reorderable, parametric history

Build solid bodies from sketches and surfaces with pads, pockets, holes, sweeps, lofts, dress-up features, booleans and patterns. Every feature lives in a single per-body history you can reorder by dragging, and every dimension is a parameter you can drive from a formula.

Works on
Parts
Toolboxes
5
The 3.0 L inline-six crankshaft in the Part Design workbench: seven main journals, six crankpins and twelve tapered counterweight webs lofted like a forging, with root fillets, rounded web edges, oil drillings and a drilled flywheel flange, and every feature named in the specification tree.
3.0 L inline-six crankshaftA forged crankshaft in Part Design

Why it matters

What stands out

One history, any order

Features of a body apply in a single user-controlled order — drag a feature in the tree to reorder it. Editing a feature re-applies only it and what follows; the unchanged prefix is reused from cache.

Pad and Pocket that read the whole sketch

Every closed contour is extruded with nesting resolved (holes and islands), with signed limits, Up to next / last / plane / surface, per-contour lengths and a Thin wall mode.

Holes and threads to standard

Simple, counterbored, countersunk, counterdrilled and tapped holes; cosmetic threads with embedded DIN 13-1/-2/-3 metric sizes that can resize a hole to its tapping diameter.

Multi-body booleans

Assemble, add, remove, intersect, union-trim or remove lumps between bodies as ordinary history features — optionally consuming the tool body only as a reference so it stays editable.

Drag it in 3D

Lengths, depths, thicknesses and angles are driven by one shared on-model manipulator that edits the same parameters as the dialog, live.

Close-up along the crankshaft: each counterweight web tapers to a flat parting line like a forging, with fillets where the webs meet the journals and crankpins, and an oil drilling in a main journal.
3.0 L inline-six crankshaftForged webs, filleted journals
The 3.0 L inline-six assembly from the intake side: a cast-style block whose bolt columns run down the skirt as ribs between cored crankcase bays, port flanges in recessed panels on the head, a finned sump, a timing cover and a grooved damper.
3.0 L inline-sixA cast engine block, not a box

Operations

Everything in Part Design

The complete inventory, toolbox by toolbox, with the icons exactly as they appear in the application.

Standard11

  • PadExtrude every closed contour of a sketch or a surface; signed limits, Up to, Thin
  • PocketSubtractive twin of Pad; a pocket sketched on a face cuts into that solid
  • ShaftRevolve a profile into material about any line, axis or plane normal
  • GrooveRevolved cut: the subtractive twin of Shaft
  • HoleSimple, counterbored, countersunk, counterdrilled or tapped; blind or Up to limits
  • ShellHollow the solid to inside/outside wall thicknesses, leaving picked faces open
  • StiffenerConstant-thickness web grown from an open profile to the material it braces
  • Multi-Sections SolidLoft material through two or more closed sections, optionally along guides
  • Removed Multi-Sections SolidThe same loft subtracted — the dialog's "Remove material" mode
  • RibSweep a closed section along a centre curve and add it
  • SlotSweep a closed section along a centre curve and remove it

Dress up4

  • Edge FilletConstant-radius rounds on picked edges or rule-based edge sets
  • ChamferLength/angle or two-length bevels, with orientation set per edge
  • Thread/TapCosmetic thread or tap with DIN 13 metric sizes; adds no material
  • Draft AngleTilt faces about a neutral plane; limiting and parting elements, both sides

Surface Features7

  • Sew SurfaceReshape the solid to follow a surface, keeping the marked side
  • Remove FaceDelete faces and heal the wound by extending the neighbours (defeaturing)
  • Close SurfaceCap a closed surface into the solid volume it encloses
  • Thick SurfaceTurn a surface into a solid by a two-sided offset
  • ThicknessOffset selected faces of the solid in or out
  • SculptPush, pull, scale, slide or tilt one face; the adjacent walls follow
  • SplitDivide the body by a surface or plane and keep one side

Boolean Operations7

  • Solid CombineThe material common to the extrusions of two profiles (side view × top view)
  • AssembleUnion that honours the tool body's own add/remove intent
  • AddUnion of the tool body into the in-work body
  • RemoveCut the tool body out of the target
  • IntersectKeep only the common volume
  • Union TrimUnion, then keep picked lumps and remove or keep designated faces
  • Remove LumpDiscard disconnected lumps of the body, keeping the picked ones

Transformation6

  • Translate/RotateRigid move of the body as a history feature, driven by the manipulator
  • MirrorReflect the body about a plane and keep both halves united
  • SymmetryReflect the body about a plane and keep only the reflection
  • Rectangular PatternRepeat a feature or the whole solid along two directions
  • Circular PatternRepeat about an axis, with concentric rings and a Complete Crown mode
  • User PatternOne instance per picked point or per point of a sketch

In use

Built with Part Design

The cutaway 8-speed planetary automatic transmission rendered photoreal in the Rendering workbench: a bead-blasted aluminium case with bright machined cut faces opens onto ground-steel helical planet gears, bronze thrust washers and copper-coloured clutch packs, on a glossy dark floor under soft studio light.

Transmission

8-speed planetary automatic

A cutaway 8-speed automatic transmission with four helical planetary sets and five shift elements, every tooth an exact involute. It reproduces all nine published gear ratios and runs a 3rd-to-4th shift as a mechanism.

Part documents
34
Mechanisms
10
Joints
649
Ratios reproduced to
6.5e-14

Part DesignSurface DesignAssemblyKinematicsRendering

Details
A complete V12 engine assembly in the ray-traced viewport: translucent block and heads reveal crankshaft, pistons, twin camshafts, valve springs and the timing belt driving both cam pulleys and the fan.

Engine

60° V12 engine

A complete 60° V12 with crank train, four camshafts, 48 valves and its accessories. One crank angle poses the whole engine.

Parts
33
Instances
181
Joints
113
Loop closure
2.8e-14 mm

Part DesignAssemblyKinematics

Details
A double-wishbone air-sprung front axle in the Kinematics workbench, posed by its driver, with every joint drawn as a glyph and the tree listing carrier, anti-roll bar, driveshafts and both wheel ends.

Chassis

Double-wishbone front suspension

A complete double-wishbone front axle with steering and driveline, measured over its whole travel and steering range — then rebuilt with bushing stiffnesses and tyre loads for a full kinematics-and-compliance study.

Part documents
30
Instances
47
Mobility
5
Camber gain
−0.016°/mm

Part DesignAssemblyKinematics

Details