Alibre Design Expert

Alibre Design Expert is our flagship design suite with mechanical design tools comparable to those you will find in SolidWorks, Pro/ENGINEER, and Inventor. In fact, if you're familiar with any of those programs, you will jump right into Alibre Design. Incorporating all of the tools we offer, it is perfect for engineers that require a wide range of powerful 3D CAD, verification, and analysis functionality. Alibre Design is the easiest 3D CAD application to learn and use, with a straightforward user interface and easy and efficient workflows.

Fully Parametric Design

Parametric design is the de facto standard for 3D mechanical design and manufacturing. If you are not using a true parametric modeler, you are wasting time. Parametric basically means that you create intelligent parts, assemblies, and drawings that can be updated later easily and with a minimum of rework. Wherever a part is used, for example in an assembly, BOM, or 2D drawing, changes will be reflected automatically.

Alibre Design is built from the ground up to be fully parametric. All modules are completely interconnected and design changes are a matter of double clicking dimensions you used to create your part originally and typing in new numbers. When you open your assembly, you will see the part has been updated for you. When you open your drawings, you will see all the views, including partial views, section views, and anything else will also be updated. The dimensions will have changed for you, and you will not waste any time needlessly redoing 2D drawings.

Part Design

Alibre Design allows you to make mechanical parts of any complexity quickly and easily. With workflows designed for quick changes and easy updating, iterating the design is an efficient process. Quickly make parts, tools, fixtures, molds, and any other surrounding manufacturing designs.

Fully Parametric Design Easily and efficiently define relationships to save time and ensure accuracy when design changes occur. Sketch Constraints, many of which get applied automatically for you, allow you to ensure real world design criteria are maintained.

Push/Pull Technology A rich push/pull toolset lets you grab things to easily change their size or position, without modifying sketches or features. This tool set is particularly useful for FEA simplification or editing imported models that have no design history.

Excel Driven Design Use or reuse your Excel data to drive classes of parts or entire assemblies easily.

Assembly Design

Alibre Design Expert makes combining multiple parts into an assembly easy. Drag-and-drop constraint management and real-time previews allow you to be less concerned with what's technically happening and more concerned with your design. Create exploded views you can reuse in 2D drawings, query the assembly's physical properties such as mass, detect collisions, and easily change or update parts directly from within the assembly workspace. Simulate assembly motion by clicking and dragging parts to see the real-world motion in action, before creating physical prototypes.

Drag and Drop Constraint Creation Intelligent snapping technology works for you to make quick work of assembling multiple parts into a physically accurate, moving virtual prototype.

Instant Exploded Views Create exploded views automatically or manually. Transfer these views into a 2D drawing, or export an animated PDF with assembly or disassembly instructions.

Interference Detection Run an interference detection to ensure that all parts fit together properly, without running into each other. Detect problems in the design phase, before creating physical prototypes that have to be scrapped.

2D Drafting

Go to the drafting page

2D drafting in Alibre Design Expert is almost automatic. You create your designs in 3D, and then use those designs to automatically create as many views as necessary in the 2D workspace. When you change the design in 3D, the changes are reflected for you in 2D. Your dimensions, orthogonal views, sections, and anything else will update accordingly. This dramatically cuts down on rework and ensures accuracy. A full set of detailing tools ensures you can put all the required information on your drawings for manufacturing.

Automatic updating The biggest waste of time in traditional 2D design software is making design changes. With Alibre Design Expert's 2D Drawing module, 2D drawings are automatically updated when you make changes to the 3D model. This saves time and more importantly ensures complete accuracy.

Export/Import DWG, DXF, and PDF Easily export your 2D drawings to DXF, DWG, and PDF formats. You can also import in existing DWG/DXF files and edit or maintain them; or use them as the basis for new 3D parts.

Sheet Metal Design

Go to the Sheet Metal page

Alibre Design Expert's integrated Sheet Metal module provides specific tools for sheet components. Instantly create flat patterns to review the design or to use in 2D drawings. A dedicated work area for sheet metal means only the tools you need are visible, providing a clean and simple workflow for efficient designing.

	Sheet Metal Design A powerful toolset lets you create sheet metal parts using the same concepts you use to manufacture them.
	One-Click Flat Patterns Easily turn your sheet metal part into a flat pattern for further verification or for use in 2D drawings.

Additional Components

Alibre Design Expert is loaded with extra features that make designing, validating, sharing, and showing off your work fast and efficient.

Amazing Photorealistic Rendering Go to the HyperShot™ page HyperShot is an amazing rendering application that takes your 3D models and turns them into stunning photo-quality images. It's super easy to use, and unlike any other rendering application on the market. You do not have to be a rendering expert to get great results, and you can be making your first images in five minutes.

Motion Simulation and Analysis Go to the Alibre Motion™ page Alibre Motion is a completely integrated motion simulation and analysis package built into Alibre Design Expert. Analyze your assembly's motion, create movies of the movement, create graphs of part velocities and other physical properties over time, and detect collisions during motion to validate the design before manufacturing prototypes.

	FEA Analysis Go to the ALGOR DesignCheck™ page ALGOR DesignCheck gives you the ability to perform stress analyses on parts so you can quickly determine whether the part will hold up to the stresses presented in real world. Iterate your designs quickly and efficiently and save money by removing unnecessary material with confidence.
	Standard Part Libraries Standard part libraries give you access to literally millions of standard and manufacturer specific components. From simple nuts and bolts to linear actuators, aerospace fasteners, motors, and hundreds of other categories. Don't design parts you don't have to, and save money using off-the-shelf components.

Complete document, contact, and process management Go to the Alibre Vault™ page The Alibre Vault is a completely integrated document and business management system. A single source model eliminates duplicates across the company and ensures everyone in your organization can find files quickly and efficiently, whether they are in the office or in another country.

Convert Models into 3D PDFs See an example The 3D PDF wizard lets you quickly turn 3D models into 3D PDFs that anyone with the free Adobe Reader can open. 3D PDFs let users interact with your model by spinning, zooming, and rotating. 3D PDF content can be used to create online interactive product catalogs, assembly/disassembly instructions, or to easily convey a design to a customer or prospect in a manner that is easy to understand.