- What "Training" Actually Means for This Exam
- Exam Format and Logistics That Shape Your Training
- The Issuer's Recommended Curriculum
- Training Map: The 14 Objective Areas
- Where Training Time Pays Off Most
- Troubleshooting Drills You Should Build Yourself
- A Domain-Sequenced Training Plan
- Choosing Training Resources Wisely
- Cost, Credits and Career Context
- Frequently Asked Questions
- The exam is a hands-on, two-hour SOLIDWORKS mold-tool assessment with a 75% minimum grade, so training must be practical, not memorization.
- SOLIDWORKS recommends Mold Design Using SOLIDWORKS and the CSWP-Mold Making Exam Prep Course as preparation.
- Fourteen published objective areas define scope, from Parting Line Creation through Surfacing; no percentage weights are published.
- There is no formal prerequisite, and a failed attempt requires a 14-day wait plus a new exam credit.
What "Training" Actually Means for This Exam
Certified SOLIDWORKS Advanced Professional Mold Making (CSWAP-MM) is not a credential you can pass by reading. SOLIDWORKS describes the assessment as a hands-on test of mold-tool use and associated mold-making knowledge. That changes what good training looks like: the goal is fluency with the Mold Tools workflow under a clock, not recognition of vocabulary terms.
It also helps to know the naming landscape. The issuer's current public exam title is SOLIDWORKS Mold Making Professional (CSWP-MM), and you will still see CSWPA-MM used as a legacy or search alias for the same Mold Making certification. When you search for training materials, expect to encounter all of these labels. If you are brand new to the credential, the explainers at What Is CSWAP-MM? and CSWAP-MM Certification cover the naming and scope in more depth.
Exam Format and Logistics That Shape Your Training
Your training should mirror the conditions you will face on test day. Several verified facts from the issuer should directly influence how you practice:
- Duration: two hours. Some older third-party sample material describes a 90-minute, nine-question format; that legacy mirror conflicts with the issuer's current limit and should not be used to set your pacing.
- Passing grade: a minimum of 75%.
- Software: SOLIDWORKS 2015 or later. Note that 2015 is the minimum supported version, not the year the current outline was published.
- Delivery: through the SOLIDWORKS/3DEXPERIENCE Certification Center using VirtualTester, via the VirtualTester Web Client. Some older general instructions still use the TesterPRO label.
- Your own setup: you need a working SOLIDWORKS installation and internet access. Dual monitors are recommended, which is a practical hint: one screen for the exam instructions, one for your model.
- No pausing: the timer continues through a computer crash or restart.
The live question total is not something we can state with confidence, so treat any specific question count you see online with caution. What you can plan around is the two-hour clock. For deeper detail on the passing threshold, see CSWAP-MM Passing Score, and for registration timing see CSWAP-MM Exam Dates.
Key Takeaway
Rehearse with a hard two-hour timer in the same SOLIDWORKS version you will test on, with a second monitor if you own one. Because a crash does not stop the clock, also practice saving frequently and recovering a mold setup quickly.
The Issuer's Recommended Curriculum
SOLIDWORKS recommends two preparation resources: Mold Design Using SOLIDWORKS and the CSWP-Mold Making Exam Prep Course. The first is a training course (document PMT2505-ENG, copyright 1995-2024, with a public table of contents on the SOLIDWORKS site). The second is positioned as targeted exam preparation.
Two honest caveats are worth stating. First, the public table of contents for the Mold Design course is a preparation curriculum, not an official exam blueprint; its lesson headings should not be mistaken for exam domains. Second, the only public statement of exam scope is the published list of objective areas, which is what the next section walks through. Official sample archives linked from the exam page were not retrievable when this article was verified, so do not assume you have seen an official sample exam unless you have downloaded one yourself directly from SOLIDWORKS.
Training Map: The 14 Objective Areas
The issuer publishes 14 top-level objective areas, in this order. No percentage weights are published, so do not assume any one area counts more than another. For a fuller narrative on each, see the CSWAP-MM exam domains guide.
| # | Objective Area | What to Train |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Parting Line Creation | Selecting and validating parting edges on a part |
| 2 | Cavity Tool | Building core and cavity from a setup |
| 3 | Draft Analysis | Interpreting draft results relative to pull direction |
| 4 | Undercut Analysis | Finding trapped and undercut regions |
| 5 | Mold Cooling Problem | Cooling-channel layout and related reasoning |
| 6 | Max Mold Opening | Calculating required opening distance |
| 7 | Parting Surface Creation | Generating and checking parting surfaces |
| 8 | Runner and Sprue fill | Feed-system geometry and volume effects |
| 9 | Shrink / Scale factor | Applying shrinkage and reading mass results |
| 10 | Shut-off Surface Creation | Closing through-openings in the part |
| 11 | Modifying Shut-off Surfaces | Editing and repairing shut-offs |
| 12 | Create Side Cores | Releasing undercut features with side action |
| 13 | Create Tapered Interlocks | Locating mold halves with tapered features |
| 14 | Surfacing | Ruled, planar, knit, filled, extend, trim and lofted surfaces |
The Surfacing area includes the issuer's nested topics: Ruled Surface, Planar Surface, Knit Surface, Filled Surface, Extend Surface, Trim Surface and Lofted Surface. It still counts as one top-level objective heading, but it is a wide one, so give it real practice time.
Where Training Time Pays Off Most
Parting lines, parting surfaces and shut-offs
Domains 1, 7, 10 and 11: The Core Split
These four areas form the backbone of any mold build, and they fail in characteristic ways. A parting line that is not closed, a parting surface that does not extend past the part, or a shut-off surface that leaves a gap will each block the cavity operation.
- Practice selecting parting-line edges, including parts where the natural split sits on a curved or stepped surface.
- Build parting surfaces on parts that need more than a simple flat extension.
- Create shut-off surfaces for holes and windows, then deliberately break them and repair them to master the modification workflow.
- Learn what a failed cavity operation tells you about which earlier step is wrong.
Analysis tools: draft and undercut
Domains 3 and 4: Reading the Part Correctly
Draft Analysis and Undercut Analysis are diagnostic. The skill is interpreting what the colors and regions mean for a chosen pull direction, then deciding what to do about them.
- Run analyses with different pull directions and note how the results change.
- Distinguish between faces that need draft added and features that genuinely need side action.
- Connect undercut findings forward to the side-core domain, since the two are closely linked in real workflow.
Calculation-style objectives
Domains 5, 6, 8 and 9: Where Numbers Matter
Mold Cooling Problem, Max Mold Opening, Runner and Sprue fill, and Shrink / Scale factor tend to produce measurable answers. These are areas where careful method matters as much as software skill.
- For maximum mold opening, work through the geometry of part height, ejection clearance and opening distance by hand, then verify in SOLIDWORKS.
- For shrink and scale, practice applying a factor and then checking how the resulting mass or volume compares with the original. Mismatched mass results are a classic place to lose points.
- For runner and sprue fill, track how feed-system geometry changes total volume.
- For cooling, rehearse the layout reasoning without assuming any add-on beyond what the exam objective states.
Side cores and tapered interlocks
Domains 12 and 13: Mechanical Mold Features
Side cores release features that cannot be released along the main pull direction. Tapered interlocks align the mold halves. Both reward candidates who understand the mechanical purpose, not just the button sequence.
- Practice creating side cores for parts with lateral holes or recesses.
- Check that the side-core direction and pull geometry are consistent with the undercut analysis.
- Build tapered interlocks on a few different part shapes so the steps become automatic.
Troubleshooting Drills You Should Build Yourself
Because official sample archives were not retrievable, and because the exam is hands-on, the most reliable training asset is a set of exercises you create. Use your own parts, or simple parts from your own work, and deliberately engineer failures to learn from:
- Broken parting line: select edges that leave a gap and observe what the cavity operation reports.
- Short parting surface: create a surface that does not fully clear the part, then diagnose and fix it.
- Leaky shut-off: create a shut-off that does not seal, then modify it until the cavity succeeds.
- Surface-knitting failure: knit surfaces with small gaps and learn what tolerances and fixes resolve it. This ties directly to the Surfacing domain and its Knit Surface, Trim Surface and Filled Surface topics.
- Side-core mismatch: point a side core in the wrong direction and see how it fails to release the feature.
- Mass discrepancy after scaling: apply a shrink factor and compare mass properties before and after to build intuition.
A Domain-Sequenced Training Plan
If you want a structured schedule, sequence it by how the mold workflow actually builds on itself rather than by an arbitrary calendar. The plan below is a suggested order, not an official one, and you should stretch or compress it to match your starting skill. For a broader plan, the CSWAP-MM study guide goes further.
Analysis and Setup
- Draft Analysis and Undercut Analysis on several parts
- Parting Line Creation on simple then curved parts
- Why first: every later step depends on reading the part correctly
Splitting the Mold
- Parting Surface Creation
- Shut-off Surface Creation and Modifying Shut-off Surfaces
- Cavity Tool, including deliberate failures and repairs
Mechanical Features and Surfacing
- Create Side Cores and Create Tapered Interlocks
- Surfacing: ruled, planar, knit, filled, extend, trim and lofted
Calculations and Full Runs
- Mold Cooling Problem, Max Mold Opening, Runner and Sprue fill, Shrink / Scale factor
- Two or more full timed two-hour mock sessions
Place the calculation-style domains late only if your geometry skills are strong; if you struggle with numbers, move Max Mold Opening and Shrink / Scale factor earlier so you have time to repeat them. Since the exam objective list has no published weights, keep your effort balanced rather than over-investing in a favorite topic.
Choosing Training Resources Wisely
The training market around this credential is mixed. You will find the issuer's own courses, reseller training pages such as GoEngineer's mold-making certification page, publisher textbooks such as The Complete Guide to Mold Making with SOLIDWORKS, community articles, video walkthroughs, and third-party practice sites. Each has a different value, and a few cautions apply:
| Resource Type | Best Use | Watch Out For |
|---|---|---|
| Issuer courses (Mold Design Using SOLIDWORKS; CSWP-Mold Making Exam Prep Course) | Authoritative workflow and exam-aligned preparation | Course table of contents is not an exam blueprint |
| Reseller and publisher materials | Structured lessons and worked examples | Check which software version and exam title they target |
| Community forums and discussions | Real troubleshooting, such as mold cooling questions | Not official exam facts; verify against the issuer |
| Video walkthroughs | Seeing the click path for a technique | Watching is not practicing; replicate it yourself |
| Third-party practice sites | Extra self-testing | Legacy counts and timers may not match the current exam |
Be especially careful with any claim about a pass rate. A training provider's own student results do not equal an overall certification pass rate, and no certification-wide figure is established here. For a measured look at what is and is not known, read CSWAP-MM Pass Rate and How Hard Is the CSWAP-MM Exam?. You can also use the CSWAP-MM practice test site to check your recall of the objective areas between hands-on sessions, while remembering that recall practice complements, rather than replaces, time spent modeling.
Cost, Credits and Career Context
The current SOLIDWORKS certification catalog lists USD 20 per attempt for North America. Unused purchased exam credits do not expire, but that credit rule is separate from any statement about how long the credential itself remains valid. A failed attempt requires a 14-day wait and a new exam credit, which is why thorough preparation beats rushing in.
There are also subscription considerations. Eligible commercial subscription customers may obtain qualifying exam benefits under the issuer's subscription offer, which provides up to three eligible exams per seat twice a year, subject to license and exam restrictions. Check with your reseller or employer, since your training and exam may be partly covered.
On requirements, the program FAQ states there are no formal prerequisites for professional certification exams, so a prior CSWP is not imposed for Mold Making. That said, if you plan to pursue the SOLIDWORKS Design Expert (CSWE) credential, Mold Making can count as one of the advanced-topic certifications used alongside CSWP, which is a useful reason to plan your path. See CSWAP-MM Requirements for the full picture.
For career value, the people most likely to benefit are mold designers, tooling engineers and product designers who work with injection-molded plastic parts and want a verifiable record of Mold Tools skill. We do not assert any certification-specific salary premium, and you should treat claims of a guaranteed raise skeptically. To weigh it for your own situation, explore Is the CSWAP-MM Certification Worth It?, the CSWAP-MM salary guide and CSWAP-MM Jobs.
Key Takeaway
Treat training as a skills project with a deadline, not a reading list. Lock in the two-hour timer, build your own failure drills across all 14 objective areas, and only then schedule your attempt.
Frequently Asked Questions
SOLIDWORKS recommends Mold Design Using SOLIDWORKS and the CSWP-Mold Making Exam Prep Course. Both are preparation resources; the published exam objective list remains the authoritative statement of scope.
No. The program FAQ states professional certification exams have no formal prerequisites, and a prior CSWP credential is not imposed for Mold Making. Practical SOLIDWORKS skill is still essential.
The current issuer page specifies two hours and a minimum passing grade of 75%. Older third-party sample guides describing 90 minutes should not be used for planning.
A failed attempt requires a 14-day wait and a new exam credit before you can try again. Unused purchased credits do not expire, so buying a credit does not start a countdown.
No. The exam cannot be paused, and the timer continues through a computer crash or restart. Make sure your SOLIDWORKS installation and internet connection are stable before you begin.
If you are ready to move from reading to doing, start with the CSWAP-MM study guide, keep the cheat sheet handy for quick reviews, and test your recall on the CSWAP-MM practice exam site as you work through each objective area.