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November 2009

Saving SolidWorks Templates to Custom Locations

By Josh Carrier, Javelin Technologies Inc.

It is often necessary to create your own customized document templates and drawing sheet formats.  The default SolidWorks save locations for these files is within a directory that should be deleted if SolidWorks is fully uninstalled properly.  If you have not created a backup of your templates, they will also be deleted.  It is because of this that it is typically advisable to create a unique folder location (outside of the SolidWorks install directory) for these files to be saved in to prevent future data loss.

When saving a document template (go to File, Save As), upon choosing the template file type from the drop down list, the save location automatically changes to the SW default template location.  This is typically “C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\SolidWorks\SolidWorks\templates”.  You can then change the save location to a custom location, such as “C:\SolidWorks Templates”.

After saving the template, you must modify the SolidWorks options to actually reference the new template location.  Go to Tools, Options, File Locations, choosing Document Templates from the drop down list.  You can then pick the Add button and browse to your new template location.

Figure 1: File Locations

After adding the new document template file location, click OK to accept this change.  If prompted to add this location as a search location, you can typically click Yes.

To use this new template, go to File, New, and the new template location will be listed as a separate tab within the New SolidWorks Document dialog box shown in the figure below.

Figure 2: New SolidWorks Document dialog box

A similar procedure can also be followed to save a drawing sheet format and then update the Sheet Format file locations within SolidWorks. It’s also possible to save document templates and drawing sheet formats to network locations.  This can then allow multiple computers to access this network location, thereby ensuring that all SolidWorks users are utilizing the exact same templates.

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