I am new to 3D printing, have printed designs that many of you have posted here and I thank you for sharing them. I have used a model railroad CAD program for my model rr layout years ago, but that is pretty much my experience with design CAD. I am a retired architect, so I have knowledge of computers and design, but left the field when design CAD was young and lucky for me or not, didn’t have to learn a whole new platform of design.
I have been dabbling with a raspberry pi and micro computer projects for the past few years and got a 3D printer for Christmas. I was really excited when I saw CyberBrick appear. I never did a KS project before, made several missteps trying to sign up and after a few days of trying i finally got the email from CyberBrick that I am a backer. Ya…
So I down loaded their files today, and see all those CAD files, was wondering, what would be a good CAD program, for a person like me to learn and use with the CyberBrick eco-system.
Learn FreeCAD. After that any 3d CAD will be easy and straightforward
However since you’re an architect (even if retired) that means you probalby know AutoCAD and other Autodesk products so Fusion360 wouldn’t be far off from what you could be accustomed to.
Adjusting 3D printed parts for the exact fitting requires numerous iterations, and parametric modeling software like Solidworks, Fusion360, and FreeCAD(?) will save time, materials and headache.
If you’re going to use it solely for personal purpose, Solidworks Maker version is $50/ year. Maker version is identical to the standard commercial version, but the saved files are not compatible with full version.
Onshape is quite easy to learn and they provide useful training courses. Without any prior knowledge I was able to start playing with it after a few hours.
The free tier leave your docs public, so be aware of that.
If you want to learn a de facto standard I would spend a little more energy with Fusion
Learn/use Blender – its open-source, works with any platform, is highly adjustable to your needs and is more than a simple CAD program… in addition you can model free-style and work like an artist. And there are thousands of tutorials on YouTube.
Blender is not CAD. Blender is a free, GPL-licensed 3D graphics software that can be used to model, texture, and animate bodies. It’s designed to create fictional objects with animation. You can use Blender like a CAD program, but it doesn’t offer all the features needed to design real components. It’s better for free form, skulpture and animation stuff.
I would recommend Fusion360 because it’s free for personal use. It offers a relatively easy entry point, and it’s still a powerful tool.
The workflow usually involves drawing many individual parts in separate files and then saving them in an assembly. The parts are then referenced.
Well, this was a good morning surprise. Thank you, Thank you all. So I know what I will be doing the rest of the week, looking over and trying out a few different CAD programs.
I also am building a 3D scanner, hopefully it will work and will need to use the CAD program to work on the scan. I really appreciate all the suggestions.
If you look deeply into Blender with all its add-ons — it is of course CAD… with many functions a CAD software cannot provide. You can easily draw shapes with measurements and extrude like you do in standard-CAD… but you also can build objects out of standard primitives like blocs, cylinders or extruded shapes with boolean combination — everything is dynamic.
I’ve been using Solidworks for 18 years and Blender since 2.6. They are two completely different animals.
Blender addons you’re referring to are CAD-like, they don’t turn Blender into a CAD. Commercial grade CAD like Solidworks can simulate real world materials for strength analysis, create tool path, simulate mechanical design and much more. All the toolsets necessary for fabricating real world projects efficiently.
With parametric modeling, iterations take seconds instead of hours with sub D/polygonal modeling. Interestingly Solidworks web apps have sub D modeling now.
The question of this post is what software is best for CyberBrick project, which mechanical engineering is a big part of it. So, CAD is the way to go.
But Blender is the way to go if you’re making action figures and other organic objects.
What program has the steepest learning curve? What program gives the fastest results? What program has the easiest way of use? With what program will you have a nice experience in building and rebuilding “things” you have in mind – following your way of thinking? What program has the most possibilities in all?
I find it funny, that even for simple designs the large battleships of the business are recommended. The (parametric) specialities of CAD are not need for simple-single-designs.
Anyways: 95% of 3d-Users don’t model at all by themself… and for the remainder… well… 95% don’t need CAD skills for a fast usable result.
btw: With AI as the future – the speciality skills to use CAD is not necessary anymore – learning them is lost time. In one~two years… CAD will become a simple task to tell the system to maybe “change the diameter to 13mm and extrude by 5mm” by voice for every standard user – no one needs to move a mouse anymore – and the result will be perfect. The future designer sits comfortable in his chair and dictates what the software has to do… so that the result pleases his imagination.
Therefore…
Better the simpliest program for a simple task – than a battleship from a dying era.
