CAD?

[artdutra04]

Develop a system for part numbers and revisions and stick to it.

Never use names like Intake Left Arm Outer Side Plate 2.sldprt as this makes it very difficult for BOM and PDF drawings when you send parts to sponsor machine shops. Names like 2014-110-001_Rev1.sldprt or 2014-110_Rev8.sldasm are much better and better prepare you for how companies in the real world work.

Don't be sloppy on your modeling. Constrain ever sketch entity - if you open a Solidworks sketch there must never be any blue lines.

Don't use project/convert geometry from an assembly into a part. It's great and fast when it works the first time but when you iterate and change designs it will be a minefield of broken references that will take for ever to fix.