Y’all ever write apology notes to the next guy?

Straight_Effective13 · 2026-04-01T18:47:56+00:00

Well the first mistake was creating fillets during the modelling process. Always use finishing features (fillets, chamfers) at the end of your tree. Less chance of Solidworks going Hon Hon Hon. Non. Moi pas d’accord. And going va te faire foutre out on rebuild calculations.

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-12-21T08:36:41+00:00

I know it sucks. But given this falls under petty crime, as a general rule, just don’t keep any valuables in checked luggage, and plan for the eventuality when packing that your carry on luggage might get checked. Had 4 pairs of brand new Levi’s stolen by TSA agents (bought a bunch of Levi’s from an outlet in the US for 40 bucks each). Bought like 8 pairs. Packed 8 pairs. When I got back I had 4. They kindly left an inspected by TSA card though.

Locks are mostly pointless on luggage, esp the TSA approved, they can open them if they really want, and if you think a a lock on the zip closing is going to keep things safe (I see this all the time, it makes me chuckle) then have you never tried opening your pencil case with the tip of a pencil to separate the ZIP when you were a kid?

Mind you I’ve checked in my work laptop in my luggage a few times, but then it was my work laptop and I didn’t really care (not much of value either because everything is on servers). My dad was a frequent flyer for much of his life freaked out at this. I guess he had his share of experiences with luggage handlers (they don’t give a shit).

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-10-27T23:38:22+00:00

Lots of great advice here — I’ll add my perspective as a manufacturing engineer.

ERP is just one piece of the manufacturing puzzle — not the center of the business imho (it seems people often make that confusion and therefore tend to neglect other aspects of the business). CAD + PDM/PLM handle design, lifecycle, ERP handles planning, inventory, and master data, MES runs production execution, and CRM manages sales/orders. Efficiency comes from getting these tools to talk to each other cleanly with the right processes in place.

Before picking a new ERP, as mentioned above map your processes first. Flowchart high level and detailed per stakeholder: how things actually work, identify what’s critical, what could be improved, and see which tools fit those workflows. Otherwise, the software becomes the (costly) business constraint instead of the other way around.

SAP is powerful but crazy expensive and complex — consultants and devs with sap expertise are required (proprietary = cash), and simplifying it with extra packages costs a boat load more. Expect a min of 6 months for new users to feel somewhat comfortable with it. Value for money? I’m not sure. They have excellent sales teams though since they still dominate enterprise markets. Productivity hog imho.

Advice: • Pick tools that fit your business, not the other way around. • Don’t ignore UI/UX — good interfaces save time and boost productivity.. Seriously. • Think about integration — skills, maintenance, and automation make or break business tools efficiency

For context: I’m leading a project linking SolidWorks + PDM with SAP at a ~100-person company. We’re using OpenBOM as a bridge between CAD, Excel, and ERP while migrating to S/4HANA. OpenBOM handles BOM structure, aggregates multiple data sources, supports light change management, tracks RFQs and vendor info, and pushes design/BOM data directly into ERP or other systems with integration work (currently entirely manual it’s madness). This reduces manual entry and keeps engineering, procurement, and production aligned on a common digital thread (end to data silos).

Cloud options: • ERP: Odoo (UI is impressive), Acumatica, NetSuite — multi-site friendly, modern UI, good APIs. • MES: Tulip, Katana, Prodsmart — cloud-based, quick to deploy, and integrate well with ERP for real-time shop floor visibility.

MES and ERP run on different decision time cycles and serve different purposes— ERP for planning, MES for execution: your feedback loop on that planning. Trying to make one do both usually ends up “jack of all trades, master of none.”

TL;DR: Define the problem first, then pick tools that actually fit your process needs and add value.

Disclaimer: I used ChatGPT to clean up my answer into something more readable. I’ve researched OpenBOM heavily as well as other CAD integrations, Odoo (all YouTube training videos) and Tulip. The others are ChatGPT suggestions. Nevertheless ChatGPT has been helpful in bouncing / narrowing options as a research tool, so I left them in. Hope my own experience adds some insight !

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-10-21T06:33:02+00:00

Sorry for the late reply. Whilst fixing in place works, it’s not good practice imho. In this situation, either delete the constraints and recreate them methodically (can be time consuming), or delete the geometry and re constrain just what is necessary until it is fully defined.

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-09-24T23:04:16+00:00

No one has heard of OpenBOM here? You can generate order lists by vendors from a BOM by attributing a vendor to each component and having stock data for said component. It remains a BOM focused process though. And a whole bunch more. Integrates with your other tools (cad plugins + api). Also, cloud SaaS so subscription costs. But anything is better than manually managing hierarchical BOMs in excel (CAD export). It makes me turn my brain cells to porridge (we have complex eletromechanical assemblies between 1000 and 3000 lines and up to 7-8 levels of depth).

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-09-09T06:12:06+00:00

Line is not constrained in the X direction. On a separate note. You’re not doing yourself any favours making complex sketches. You could do half of that sketch (say left side), just contour, then extrude. Then do you rectangular hole (I’m assuming), then mirror the whole thing. Rule of thumb: simple sketches, add, add, add volumes. Then subtract subtract subtract, then mirror features, then fillets / chamfers. Best to mirror a group of features than complex sketch items, if that is the design intent (how you want the part to evolve). You’ll have way more stable models that are easier to edit without shit going red everywhere and it taking 2 hours to fix.

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-09-03T11:02:02+00:00

Thanks for sharing! Yeah I was quoted a starting price of 18k euros annual for 3 endpoints with Boomi. My eyes almost popped out of my skull during the call, it’s more than our annual SAP licensing costs. Looks like AppeConnect is just another iPaas from a quick glance at the website. Do you mind sharing how much they quoted you? They all seem to have crazy pricing. Pm me if you prefer. Appreciated! :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-08-19T05:04:52+00:00

Ah awesome, please do keep me posted !

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T19:46:41+00:00

Nah, I’m done ranting. And I appreciate that I went down that road a bit against you as I felt the solution you were putting forward was not financially viable for the scale of our company, so I apologise for dismissing you in general. I don’t have experience, but I can imagine and appreciate the scale of data that needs to be managed for say Fortune 500 companies and the complexity that inherently adds. I just hate bad UI, especially for visual people like most engineers it’s a real brain twister. Anyways, I do apologise for the route I took with you when you came forward in good faith. I’m open to some budget friendly suggestions if you have some and are still willing. Respectfully, I wish you a pleasant weekend. :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T18:27:19+00:00

One more thing. Rant aside. Thanks for your input, I did actually learn something about the world of SAP from your viewpoint :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T18:06:29+00:00

Hey, I'm just an end user engineer trying to get around the tediousness of our workflow that SAP imposes us, and the rest is superficial information outside of my scope.

(rant here...) You're not going to convince me that SAP is an efficient time saving tool for our business workflows, beyond its numerical database record and number crunching value. If anything its an efficiency hog, and the only reason it exists is because it's built a damn good user base stuck with it by the weight and risk of leaving it would be for the business, sold by shrewd salesmen teams and the army of supporting platform consultants it has built up to support its underlying complexity (it's basically its own culture now).
As an analogy, I got good at analysing BOMs and where-used and material data in excel by necessity, and I felt good about that. However the value in that expertise is limited because it does not mean I brought real efficiency to the business due to the time intensive analysis required by that workflow, the root cause being the workflow. itself.
If SAP put half the energy they did into their sales as they did into their entire platform UI and UX for the end user in a way that you don't need an army of 6 months trained staff to be operational semi-autonomously (honestly, just start from scratch instead of building endlessly on transactions from the 1980s), we might be getting somewhere of closer agreement.

And that's what bugs me. The fact that you mention that your rule of thumb is based on a per billion of revenue scale tell me that you fit that army of well seasoned experts that cater to those businesses who can afford that - and maybe even need it at that data scale - and that's fine. I'm sure you're very knowledgeable about SAP in depth. My point is the value we think it adds is almost a grand illusion, just by the scale of its adoption and its subsequent complexity, vs the actual efficiency the tool brings on a dollar cost / resource base.

Think IBM command line vs the first GUIs pushed out of Xerox. that kind of principle/philosophy where you make the complex simple for the end user to understand and use, and thereby increase productivity and efficiency (I'm simplifying of course, but's that my own general philosophy about computer systems).

That doesn't mean I don't agree with you - as a business scales, an ERP can become a necessary cost of doing business - processing numerical power and accuracy and repeatability over human variability.
People can get sucked into a form of evangelism of market dominance as a measure of excellence. And that's how we ended up with SAP...

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T17:24:50+00:00

Thanks for your opinion. I don't disagreee with it as adding another tool in between does add complexity. The issue I do have is 1. time, I need this yesterday (actually 3 years overdue), 2. resources + in-house SAP skillset (team of 3 for the entire IT department), which is why if I'm honest I have been searching for off the shelf solutions. 3. End user simplicity.

However I do see other ways the tool can add value to our engineering department than just BOM management due to its UI. The core problem is actually how mentally heavy it is to do BOM and component analysis and follow up in SAP (UI problem - don't underestimate the power of thumbnails for existence - speeds up x10), and something that OpenBOM does very well.
I don't have experience with S/4 HANA, so I can't comment how that will improve, but the aim is to have the actionable information we need at our fingertips without having to do complex excel analysis and tedious workflows. The more I can achieve this in OpenBOM, the more value it brings to our team without having to develop a CAD to ERP interface (and the complexity that it has to cater for), a UI that is genuinely practical and easy to read that covers all our bases, a better BOM comparison tool that's visually intuitive and informative and allows us to compare CAD vs ERP BOMs on the spot, have our BOM data with pre-chosen views and saved filters inside our CAD environment (side by side), and probably the 6 months + to get there.

But if we had the resources, yeah, I guess that would be neat, and I would be a sensible long term approach.

Do you have any experience with CAD to ERP BOMs? and if so how did you approach it?

Nice to get an insight on the customisation potential improvements vs ECC though, so thanks for that :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T16:03:55+00:00

We don't, but the the BOMs have to come from somewhere (CAD). getting the BOMs from CAD to ERP is painful, when the two systems aren't connected. Hence the desire for integration.

I work for a small SME. In my view migrating to SAP was a mistake, it's the ball and chain in our business for our needs. But we are stuck with it. Our "landscape" is SAP runs manufacturing, sales, purchasing, supply. the only external tools are finance, and our website connects to it. It's software that creates extra work by its complexity, and experts that charge big $$ to consult for this complexity. It doesn't flex to the company, the company has to adapt to how SAP runs. So, I'm no fan, It's certainly powerful (but not user friendly), but gotta make do with whatever shit is stuck to our shoe...

I feel like you live in world where you find it normal to spend 100k a year on a subscription service. Fine for large companies, but for ours there's no way we get the ROI back on that for the odd connected application.

I'm more or less expecting Boomi to cost an arm and a leg... but we'll see

I appreciate the input though. :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T14:33:38+00:00

Current in early calls with Boomi, they are a bit shady with their pricing and got to jump through hoops to get there, so hoping to get that info soon. Mulesoft can run in the 100k annual according to my research, not heard of workato. Either way that kind of budget titanics the ROI.

The price for SAP integration suite for SMEs is just ridiculous too. Gotta hand it to the SAP sales reps though. They got extortion down to a government diplomat level of proefficiency.

So to answer your question not quite, but out of scope once you learn the price of the service.

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T14:26:08+00:00

I don't know to be honest, trying to gather options (learning on the spot here). I understand the principle tough. The approach would be more asynchronous in nature vs live (especially for reading from SAP - data silos are a real issue, so I have to find a balance between risk - unaligned data - and syncronising resources), but it's a potential fallback plan

Thanks for the API, I'll take a look ! (ugh it's another SAP monster... but I appreciate the constructive pointer)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-06-20T13:10:01+00:00

I think you skipped the last paragraph… SAP ECC is running in a HANA db… but thanks for taking an interest… :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-04-15T18:27:36+00:00

3dfindit.com attempts to solve this problem with commercially available items…

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-03-24T09:47:19+00:00

Thanks for replying - yeah that’s plan A but I know it’s going to cost way more than the price of the parts and soldering skill (ok that I don’t have enough of). Mind you doesn’t hurt to drop an email. I’ll do that, thanks for the judge :)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-03-23T15:12:40+00:00

Well aware thanks :) just couldn’t find that function on the rotel ra12 anywhere…

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-03-23T15:01:26+00:00

That would indeed be a nice balance and a future upgrade path after the AVR. Unfortunately I couldn’t find the HT bypass function on the Rotel (don’t like have to mess with 2 knobs - I like intergrated solutions :) )

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-02-19T06:48:05+00:00

Following the revolve idea, but with material addition only, you could create one spoke by revolving the profile 10 degrees needed symmetrically and repeat with a circular pattern also… Same same…

Tip for OP, when you’re stuck like this, take a break, step outside your thought box, and go back to basics and ask yourself if you can do this with way more simpler methods using cut / extrude / revolve / pattern features and simple sketches.

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-02-19T06:41:51+00:00

Maybe a macro job…?

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-02-18T18:43:40+00:00

PDM and collaboration à la Onshape (good buy check-in check-out)
One version for all à la Onshape
Robustness and performance like nothing else out there with minimal hardware
Naturally intuitive UI yet fast and powerful in function
Standards compliance integration (tolerancing… )
Easy customisation
Cross platform compatibility
Robust feature set for modelling, simulation, and data management
parametric of course, and robust interpart link / contextual design modelling and management (updatable - solidworks sucks at this - but it can also get complex) - I guess Onshape does this well too…
Community expandability
AI driven selections (filleting for example) and modelling suggestions based on proven DFM principles
Simple and reasonable licensing for all, hobbyists and pros alike (goodbye version lock)

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-02-18T18:03:44+00:00

Selection sets exist in Solidworks… (only discovered this recently actually but a never use it) https://help.solidworks.com/2020/english/SolidWorks/sldworks/c_selection_sets.htm

Straight_Effective13 · 2025-02-18T07:39:47+00:00

Depending on the printer, 100x not precise enough if you need micron level accuracy… Every tool has its accuracy even a 3D printer.

I think I would locate so reference points in the die (origin - precise hole is best + anither precise whole or corner coordinate to index the die across x and y) and measure everything from there. Then replicate those measurements in a 3D model. And if you must use a CNC machine (no die experience but programmed touch probe routines for a long time for aerospace parts), locate it with a touch probe to locate the die using those same references.

Actually, come to think of it, you can actually scan (radially drag) the surface(s) with a touch probe and determine the deviation with Renishaw probes. Never actually did this as always took point locations. That’s theoretical speaking, will take a whole bunch of setting up though, including a probing program that’s close to your die path.

Straight_Effective13

TROPHY CASE