{"id":58448,"date":"2025-09-03T08:00:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-03T12:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/?p=58448"},"modified":"2025-09-02T15:41:34","modified_gmt":"2025-09-02T19:41:34","slug":"best-practices-for-managing-weldment-structures-and-cut-lists-on-the-3dexperience-platform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/2025\/09\/best-practices-for-managing-weldment-structures-and-cut-lists-on-the-3dexperience-platform.html","title":{"rendered":"Best Practices for Managing Weldment Structures and Cut Lists on the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform"},"content":{"rendered":"

Weldment design is never just about the CAD model\u2014it\u2019s about ensuring that every member, every cut, and every material specification flows smoothly from design to production. You can enhance this workflow with the ability to manage and visualize SOLIDWORKS cut lists on the 3D<\/strong>EXPERIENCE platform. This functionality enables you to assign a cut list for a sheet metal or weldment part that includes all the metadata and properties of the part, ensuring design accuracy, better collaboration, and downstream manufacturing.<\/p>\n

Weldment structures often serve as the backbone of structural designs and are found in a wide variety of products, including automation equipment, scientific machinery, industrial equipment, and many other specialized products. A weldment structure is a body that consists of multiple metallic structural members that are welded together.<\/p>\n

The SOLIDWORKS weldment design functionality makes it possible to design a weldment structure as a single multibody part, from sketching the basic framework and creating structural members with groups of sketch segments, to adding elements like gussets and end caps to complete the structure. In addition, you can create designs that have extrusions and generate the cut lists and bills of materials (BOMs) required for manufacturing.<\/p>\n

Why is the ability to design and save weldment parts as a single multibody part important? Instead of creating a full assembly with dozens or even hundreds of separate parts, you can capture the whole weldment structure in a single part file. Plus, changes to the sketch or structure automatically update for all related members in the structure.<\/p>\n

The Value of Cut lists <\/strong><\/p>\n

Current methods of saving cut lists on Excel sheets and other formats often lead to a broken digital thread. You add your cut list to a weldment, put it on a drawing, export it, and send it along to manufacturing, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and production. But if there is a design change, cut lists will need to be manually updated and exported again, costing your design team time.<\/p>\n

With the ability to save and manage cut lists on the platform, you can avoid this scenario. When a change is made on a design it is automatically reflected in the cut list, keeping teams connected and production rolling. Engineers, project managers, and manufacturers have access to a single source of truth, reducing miscommunication and accelerating collaboration. When weldment cut lists are tied to PLM attributes, teams gain, real-time updates across projects, traceable revisions and approvals, reduced risk of shop-floor rework, and improved procurement accuracy.<\/p>\n

The SOLIDWORKS cut list feature is designed to simplify the process of communicating the BOM for multi-body designs.<\/p>\n

After creating the first structural member in a part, SOLIDWORKS adds a weldment feature and a cut list feature in the FeatureManager design tree. The cut list in the part acts like a solid body’s folder, where each unique weldment body resides in a separate folder with the name \u201cCut-List-Item.\u201d You can assign custom properties to these items. Lastly, the software prepares a weldment cut list that appears as a table in the drawing. The weldment cut list contains all information similar to a BOM. The cut list groups bodies automatically based on similar geometry.<\/p>\n

Types of Cut lists:<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Structure Member- bodies created using structure system or structural member features.<\/li>\n
  2. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Sheet Metal Member- bodies created using sheet metal features.<\/li>\n
  3. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Generic Member- all other bodies in a part, created using generic modeling features.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Publishing Cut List Items on the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform<\/strong><\/p>\n

    To publish cut list items, save the SOLIDWORKS part as a weldment part on the 3D<\/strong>EXPERIENCE platform. The side panel displays the extension of the weldment part as \u201cSW Weldment Part.\u201d Keep in mind to save the SOLIDWORKS part as a weldment part, it must meet the following criteria:<\/p>\n