Design Software

I have, thanks to the help of many on this forum, especially Uncle Bob, managed to gain a little confidence when printing .stl files that others have made. I am ready to start making my own .stl files. I have tried Sketchup, and I was unhappy with it's resolution. I have tried Tinkercad, and while it is easy to do simple stuff, I don't want to do simple stuff. I have looked at wings, which looks great for a person who is a sculptor, but I am not a sculptor. I come from manufacturing, and that means that I want to be able to measure everything I do easily down to .001 inches or .01mm. I loved everything about Blender but I couldn't get the D#@n measuring tool to work. Is there open source, freeware out there that gives you all the flexibility of Blender with the precise measuring tools of a CAD program?

Try autodesk 123D. Its a free app, and its pretty powerful. I'm still learning it.

Even though I recommend this, I also suggest you look at openscad. Openscad allows you to create objects through mathametical representation. It is also free.

I'd second the use of OpenSCAD for mechanical parts, but I'd say its more of a programming language based 3D object generator than a mathematical generator.

A lot depends on your background. If you have used CAD before (ProE, SolidWorks, AutoCAD) then the Autodesk stuff will make a lot of sense. If you are a C programmer, OpenSCAD will be a good starting point. If you are a graphics / video person, none of them will make much sense.

OpenSCAD is very nice for designs that you want to vary based on settings. Cube with XX mm sides where you put in the side dimension is a good (and easy) example. Doing complicated stuff is quite possible, but tiring. AutoDesk is a bit more drag and drop oriented and for most, easier for fancy designs.

Quote
Nununugent
I come from manufacturing, and that means that I want to be able to measure everything I do easily down to .001 inches or .01mm. I loved everything about Blender but I couldn't get the D#@n measuring tool to work. Is there open source, freeware out there that gives you all the flexibility of Blender with the precise measuring tools of a CAD program?

Have a look at FreeCAD. It's an open source parametric, history-based CAD modeler running on Windows, Linux and Mac, although on Mac it does not run as well.

FreeCAD has tools that make it the best choice IMO (regarding open source offerings anyway) for mechanical parts. Tools that don't exist in OpenSCAD, Blender or Sketchup.

You first draw constrained sketches to build 3D features. You can then edit your sketches to modify the 3D model.

Here's an example with the Y_Motor bracket from the TAZ 1.0: [youtu.be]
At 1:13 I delete a dimension in the base sketch to show that when not totally constrained, you can stretch a profile by dragging it and the 3D model updates as soon as you let go.

This is comparable to parametric CAD software like SolidWorks or Inventor. Of course, FreeCAD has a very long way to go to be on par with the pro/commercial offering, and is not as stable, but for hobby use it is certainly sufficient.

BTW the current stable release of FreeCAD only supports millimeters, but US units (feet, inches) support is being worked on, and partial support has been rolled out in the development code base.

A good tut. for OpenScad.

A free CAD program called DesignSpark Mechanical is good tut.'s here.

---

__________________________________________________________________________
"I like to be, what I like to see, in you and me.
I am the Stallion, Mang."

ISTAR Scope Club

FYI DesignSpark Mechanical is a gutted version of SpaceClaim, which is a paying CAD package. DesignSpark cannot export to real CAD formats like STEP or IGES, which makes it severely limited IMO. But I guess for people who only want to export to STL to print objects I guess it's OK. Still, as a matter of principle, I dislike this.

That said, I tested SpaceClaim once, and I liked the way it works, it's like Sketchup on steroids.

Thanks for all the great info! I am a MAC guy, which at times has seemed to limit me, but I always find a work around. I will surely look at many of these suggestions over the next week or so and figure out what is the best fit for me!

Sorry but some suggestions don't work on Mac. For example, DesignSpark Mechanical is a Windows-only app.

As for FreeCAD, there's a Mac build, but it suffers from Mac-specific bugs, because there is no experienced Mac user/developer sticking around the project long enough to help fix them. That's the problem with open source projects, getting people to help...

And really, doing CAD on Mac limits your options.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/26/2013 09:21PM by NormandC.

I went through the same issue last couple of days. I have worked hard for last few weeks or so, and finally got
my RepRap Mendelmax 2.0 up and running . Now that is works (and printed 3 really nice X-mas tree
ornaments), I wanted to try something of my own. I had plenty of prior experience with solidworks at work.

So, I tried OpenSCAD first. It is very interesting - I am amazed at beautiful minds of people who
prefer to use this - You really need to think well in 3D to write a descriptive code like that! It seems to run
C in interpretive mode, and You can create variety of objects. But it seems too complicated
of a way to draw practical objects.

Since I used Solidworks before, I searched the web to see what is similar to it, and tried
FreeCAD. It is opensource and free. Installed in couple of seconds, and works great for me.
I went through a first tutorial and was able to start drawing and making STLs of my own in under
10 min. Highly recommended, for now. If I change my mind, I will let you know.