Formation or destruction of hyperbolic chaotic attractor under parameter variation is considered with an example represented by Smale--Williams solenoid in stroboscopic Poincar{e} map of two alternately excited non-autonomous van der Pol oscillators.
The transition occupies a narrow but finite parameter interval and progresses in such way that periodic orbits constituting a skeleton of the attractor undergo saddle-node bifurcation events involving partner orbits from the attractor and from a non-attracting invariant set, which forms together with its stable manifold a basin boundary of the attractor.
