Yes to draw all these parts takes alot of hours but I intend to be getting into this more in the future and the library of parts is then extremely helpful for future designs and this is how Stern designs games
actually Solidworks is pretty good and I just taught myself. My background was on the tools building light aircraft then cnc machinery for a total of 17 years and lastly custom fit-out of high end motorhomes 3 years then pulled my finger out and did mechanical engineering studies and been into project & asset management since so designing is a way for me to stay in touch with designing skills. I used autocad and similar in the first 2 jobs but nothing 3d. It's only that when I got into pinball a few years ago did I get into 3d design and find it valuable as I can fine tune my designs, test assemblies etc before I make a thing and in the engineering world is the standard approach. I am yet to put my design into a physical test but confident that somethings will be right from the get go and some won't - half the fun and part of the learning.
For me time is my challenge and since having young kids I don't get alot of shed time at the moment so designing in 3d at night suits my time allowances.
I was in a different job about 18months ago and was using the Autocad version of a 3d package - Inventor and did NOT find it as friendly at all, Autocad 2d is a horrible package compared to Solidworks and these guys were the originals in 3d drawing software and made it very approachable.
As for designing parts, it is really a matter of your approach:
machinist approach - start with a stock piece of material (say a cube) and then remove sections as if you were machining parts away.
building approach - adding materials / shapes to a existing shape and build it up
I tend to use both styles and it doesn't matter.
eg for a builders approach if we wanted to draw up a post in a game that the rubber sleeves slide over:
- select view - I would go for a top view
- sketch 1 - draw a circle, and then enter the diameter the same as the threaded bolt, then tick to finish
- feature 1 - select the circle and then a heap of 3d options are shown - select extrude and type in the distance, then tick finish
- sketch 2 - select sketch function and it will ask for a face in which you select and this is for the flange that sits on top of the playfield and then draw a circle and type in the required diameter and repeat a few times
with experience and practice the post might take a couple of minutes and the rubber sleeve is really simple and be 1 minute. Some other parts can take hours but apart from time it doesn't cost you anything in materials, manufacturing, contract costs to test and simulate.
Also if you want to get into 3d printing you need to learn 3d design to then create a STL file to then 3d print.