Thursday June 20, 2019 at 2:05pm
3D Folkes is a
professional 3D printing and CAD design service provider based
in Sheffield. They pride themselves in delivering high quality product
development, prototyping, 3D scanning and other creative solutions, specialising in 3D Printing. As a
manufacturing partner of Hubs, the
world’s largest network of manufacturing services, and a Made in Sheffield license holder, they
are a young company we should all watch out for.
Now in their 6th office, based out of the city centre of
Sheffield in the UK, the company has a focused vision to save companies money
through economical prototyping and product development. Highly regarded as
being a reliable company that you can trust when it comes to producing
high-quality parts with excellent customer service, their team of designers and
range of 3D printers means 3D Folkes has become a place that can accommodate a
variety of 3D printing and design requirements.
With specialities in product
development and both the engineering and architectural industries, Ben Folkes
first experience with SOLIDWORKS was at university: ‘After learning SOLIDWORKS at University before I started the company,
I fell in love with how intuitive it is compared to using other CAD programs.
When I started the business, I unfortunately lost access to SOLIDWORKS, having
left university, so I had to resort to free programs whilst the foundations of
the business were laid. Once we reached a point of becoming profitable, one of
our first investments was in our CAD software - something our business depends
on and we use more frequently than anything else in the company. SOLIDWORKS was
an easy choice from past experience and this has allowed us to have a much
greater control over the whole design process whilst being able to improve the
aesthetics of our designs. Just as importantly, we were also able to shave off
huge amounts of design time, therefore increasing our margins dramatically.
Ben stresses the importance of choosing not only the right
CAD vendor, but also a service provider that works as a partner, ‘As we were getting used to it [SOLIDWORKS]
in the first year of our SOLIDWORKS license, having access to the support team at
Solid Solutions became vital for us to avoid major delays when we were stumped
by problems. Some were design related and others were computer issues on our
end, which were just as easy for the support team to solve for us. I'd highly
recommend making the most of having a great support team on your side.’ During preparations for the RedBull Soapbox Race, where our Solid Solutions team of graduate engineers
took part, 3D Folkes were our 3D printers of choice for our car’s bodywork.
To find out more about 3D Folkes, please visit their
website: https://3dfolkes.co.uk/