What CAD program do you all use?

General Forum Stuff...Introduce yourself

What CAD program do you all use?

Postby artofmystate » Mon May 14, 2012 10:07 pm

I want to build a machine to automatically cut dowel rods down to various sizes and I would like to draw the machine in CAD first. Which CAD program do you all use to draw up your machines in? Also, is anyone willing to share their libraries used for the Makerslide, various extruding, and other miscellaneous components?

Thanks.
artofmystate
 
Posts: 17
Joined: Thu Jan 19, 2012 9:27 pm

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby sports.racer » Mon May 14, 2012 11:48 pm

Check out Google Sketch Up. There's already a library of Makerslide components available for it.

http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/ ... ng=m&hl=en
sports.racer
 
Posts: 23
Joined: Thu Jun 03, 2010 11:11 pm

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby mattrsch » Mon May 14, 2012 11:51 pm

I use Autodesk Inventor, which you can get for free if you have access to a .edu email address. I generally get my models of individual components directly from the vendor (McMaster and Misumi are both very good about this) or from 3D content central: http://www.3dcontentcentral.com/ All the really common stuff like bolts/nuts/standard beam and extrusion profiles are built into inventor.
mattrsch
 
Posts: 98
Joined: Wed Jul 21, 2010 5:09 pm

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby butterfingers » Tue May 15, 2012 1:37 am

I tried OpenSCAD, but found it clunky. I'm now trying FreeCAD, which is still clunky but at least intuitive.

More interesting to me is where to go next. My workflow will probably be something like:

1) Paper sketches
2) FreeCAD to create solid models (can output STL, but not great)
3) Note sure - some tool to convert to STL and validate
4) Slic3r to convert STL to GCODE
5) Printrun for output to printer

Comments?
butterfingers
 
Posts: 65
Joined: Thu Feb 16, 2012 8:49 am

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby lovebugjunkie » Tue May 15, 2012 3:26 pm

I have been playing with Hexagon for a month or two. Lot of free online videos on how to use it. So far I like it better than any other 3D type program I have tried.
http://www.daz3d.com/i/products/hexagon?

Tutorials (free on line) or buy a DVD
http://www.geekatplay.com/hexagontutorials/index0.php
http://www.geekatplay.com/hexagontutorials/begining.php
lovebugjunkie
 
Posts: 50
Joined: Fri Sep 10, 2010 6:18 pm
Location: Arizona City Arizona

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby WhiteB0rd » Wed May 16, 2012 12:48 am

butterfingers wrote:I tried OpenSCAD, but found it clunky.


It is clunky, the learning curve is steep, and it ain't drag and drop.

It took me a while, but working with the included code examples and some of the designs I downloaded from the thingiverse, I've mostly figured it out. My BS is in mathematics, so that helps a lot with the formulae and visualization even if I haven't used most of those brain cells in almost 30 years.


Still trying to find the right free or inexpensive CAD package, not happy with anything I've looked at yet.



WB
WhiteB0rd
 
Posts: 60
Joined: Thu Feb 16, 2012 2:04 am
Location: South Central PA, USA

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby butterfingers » Wed May 16, 2012 1:33 am

WhiteB0rd wrote:
butterfingers wrote:I tried OpenSCAD, but found it clunky.


It is clunky, the learning curve is steep, and it ain't drag and drop.


My degree's in Computer Aided Engineering. Even 20+ years ago professional grade CAD systems were far more elegant than OpenSCAD, and that was on Sun 386i. Shame, really.

FreeCAD's pretty decent, but I'll probably just put down a hundred bucks and buy something.
butterfingers
 
Posts: 65
Joined: Thu Feb 16, 2012 8:49 am

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby dwjp » Wed May 16, 2012 3:01 am

Any other suggestions on a cheapish MCAD package?

I used Inventor at work (which I quite liked, once I climbed the learning curve), but I can't afford a non-academic license. Even the LT version seems to be $2k or so. Alibre seems like a reasonable substitute -- the entry level version would be fine if not for the crippled import/export features (no STEP), which leaves me with the $1k professional version, which is still a bit steep (though I am considering it).
dwjp
 
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon May 31, 2010 7:41 am

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby DeweyOxberger » Wed May 16, 2012 3:11 am

I use LibreCad - it's open source, has a clunky user interface, and is a throw-back to Autocad from the 1990's. Still, it works and it has been fairly solid.
DeweyOxberger
 
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed May 02, 2012 3:39 am

Re: What CAD program do you all use?

Postby WhiteB0rd » Wed May 16, 2012 3:27 am

butterfingers wrote:
My degree's in Computer Aided Engineering. Even 20+ years ago professional grade CAD systems were far more elegant than OpenSCAD, and that was on Sun 386i. Shame, really.

FreeCAD's pretty decent, but I'll probably just put down a hundred bucks and buy something.


Still have the Sun 386i? They're quite collectable in the Sun hardware rescue community, or use to be. I broke my addiction (mostly, no NEW old Suns).

I've been frustrated with Freecad. I can't seem to get it to import and export things I would like it to and like the dox say it will. I'm running on a mac, so wonder if that's the issue.....

I've been meaning to take another look at BRLcad. It's been YEARs (and beers) since I tried playing with it, so I'm wondering if the interface, docs and tutorials have improved.


Meanwhile, OpenSCAD......




WB
WhiteB0rd
 
Posts: 60
Joined: Thu Feb 16, 2012 2:04 am
Location: South Central PA, USA

Next

Return to General Discussion

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 15 guests

cron