Can Solidworks 2008 or 2009 files be saved as earlier versions?

[squale]

I have Solidworks 2008 and 2009. Sometimes I want to give my part files to a machine shop but they only have Solidworks 2007. Can I save my 2008 or 2009 created files for the 2007 version? I know applications like Microsoft Office allow you to save for earlier versions, I don't know if Solidworks does too???


also, how do you tell what version of Solidworks a .slprt file is?

[tnik]

nope, this is not possible.. The only thing you can do is save as a world readable file like STEP, IGES, STL, etc..

[squale]

anyway to know what version of solidworks your .sldprt file was built in? I looked in solidworks explorer and it doesn't say what version of solidworks built the file..

[tnik]

I can't see any way of telling.. so my guess is no.

[DareBee]

parasolid is the best "dumb" part to use as transfer for that application.

[squale]

why is parasolid dumb? isn't the .slprt file built on a parasolid kernal? so shouldn't the parasolid have everything the .slprt file has?

[JerryFlyGuy]

yess/no..

SW does [as I understand it] have a parasolid type modeling kernel but the SW model also has feature creation data included w/ it [sorta a super-parasolid file], things like.. linked features, driven dimensions, etc etc..

The reason Sw won't save a new file as an old file is because they are always improving the software and adding new features to it.. if I wanted to save my 2008 surface model as a 2003.. how would the 2003 read in the boundry surface features..?? They didn't exist in the 2003 software..!

You can see the catch 22 issue that comes along w/ this.. for now if you want to open a new model in an older program it means a 'dumb' solid.

[jschaudt]

I'm the proud user of a mistake. It is called solidworks 2011. I designed the darned file, and now I can do nothing with it. Didn't know this issue when the machine shop said he couldn't make the artistic curve on our design. He has 2010, and the file is BEAUTIFUL!!!

Yippee!

[tnik]

Thats OK jschaudt.. You can always save as a parasolid file and he can import that.

[jschaudt]

Originally Posted by tnik Thats OK jschaudt.. You can always save as a parasolid file and he can import that.

That's one of the things I exported to. I decided to give it a try importing back in. Solidworks shows it dumb, grey and perfect. Then it asks to repair or verify (whatever it is) the shape, and it loses my artistic faces immediately.

I think I'll be driving over to the machine shop to redraw this one.