What CAD/3D software do people use?

cj7hawk · Post by **cj7hawk** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 12:07 am

Hi,

I was just wondering what software people use to design their models?

And also what their experiences were with it?

Thanks
David.

roller · Post by **roller** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 3:44 am

Here's a start point ... http://www.pp3dp.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... &hilit=cad

I still use Sketchup for quick and dirty models. Often it depends on who and what I am working with. I am trying to get into using Rhino more (not free) and I really need to find the time to try to get as familiar with Autodesk 123D Design as it does give a nice tool sweet for my CNC and 3D printing needs ... all for free.

http://www.123dapp.com/

mb20music · Post by **mb20music** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 3:46 am

www.tinkercad.com

DrewPetitclerc · Post by **DrewPetitclerc** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 6:48 am

SolidWorks 2012

rvalle · Post by **rvalle** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 8:38 am

If you have a software development background, I recommend openscad.

It is not interactive, except for visualisation. Building models is just as programming, very easy.

There are lots of things already done, which you can easily modify.

There is a tutorial that in 10 minutes will get you up and running.

I got my UP a couple of weeks ago and got up to speed very quickly.

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 9:46 am

I still use Sketchup. It's a dead end, though.
But it's the only software that runs on even my oldest computers and I think for a amateur who studies social sciences I've gone a long way, from simple squares to mechanical parts

It's amazing what is possibl with patience and other people's great scripts.
Along with all the freely available plug-ins it's a great tool, easy to learn and OK for quick designs.

Organic or complex CAD is a problem though, possible, but the workflow will be easier in, say, sculptris for organic and a commercial/professional CAD for complex parts- Or openScad or even Blender if you can wrap your head around them.
What do you plan on making?

Carnivore · Post by **Carnivore** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 5:22 pm

Solid works 2013

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

amd-tec · Post by **amd-tec** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 8:37 pm

SpaceClaim and SolidEdge.

frodobaggins · Post by **frodobaggins** » Tue Dec 10, 2013 3:56 pm

I generally use one these programs depending on the project I'm working on. All will save an stl file. The basic programs are good to model a single part. The complex ones are useful to design an assembly. I have also used Blender for art objects and sometimes to make adjustments to an stl before printing.

Tinkercad
Honeycomb
FreeCad
designspark mechanical
creo elements direct express
Blender

josejuako · Post by **josejuako** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 1:37 am

Solidworks and Rhinoceros , but Rhino is my best tool !.

J

Christina · Post by **Christina** » Fri Dec 20, 2013 5:10 pm

My preference is 3ds Max & ZBrush however I've started to tinker around in Tinkercad. Still trying to figure out Autodesk 123D.

Astro · Post by **Astro** » Sat Dec 21, 2013 1:41 am

I use Cubify Invent exclusively. It's cheap, good tutorials and is easy for me to use. I found it after tinkercad was first winding up and I haven't looked back

Trent

chippwalters · Post by **chippwalters** » Tue Dec 24, 2013 12:44 am

For 3D Printing, it's important to create 'watertight' models, and typically the software which does this best are the group know as 'solid modelers.' 3DMax, Alias, MODO, SketchUp, Softimage, Blender3D and others are "surface modelers' and they do not automatically create 'watertight' models. While they CAN be used, the more complex the model the harder and more time it will take to 'stitch it up' and make it watertight. Surface Modelers just WORK.

If you have the money and time to learn them, programs like Solidworks, Autodesk Inventor and Pro Engineer are fantastic and can model virtually anything your mind can conceive of. There are others which are much less expensive, like TinkerCAD, Autodesk 123, and many others which are even free.

There are 'hybrid' approaches as well, which use surface models but generally always create watertight surfaces-- Rhino 3D is a good example of this type of modeler. Moi3D as well.

For me, the question is more about the speed of learning an application vs the speed of actually creating something. While scripting solutions like OpenSCAD are interesting, you can't really design and build anything of great detail without a huge amount of effort or building custom toolsets-- so those are out.

I can go weeks without opening my 3D modeler, so it needs to be simple and because I mostly now do 3D printing, it must be powerful and a solid modeler. And because, IMO, SketchUp is the damn easiest product to learn and use, I would like whatever I use to do that cool 'push/pull' thing SU does. And I need to be able to jump in and out of the 3d program...then back in without having to redo the learning curve all over again.

So, I've chosen Autodessys Bonsai3D / FormZ as the product for me. It's very much like SketchUp only it's a solid modeler and super easy to use. Plus it's really accurate, has nurbs and advances editing features (skin/ thicken/ create a screw thread / fillets and radiuses, etc.). While it's a tad more expensive, it's not near the range of Solidworks, and because I spend so much time in front of my computer (not in front of my 3d printer), I'd rather spend a little more to get IMO a much greater return. The first part I built was much more sophisticated than an earlier version done is SketchUp and 1/4 the time!

I'll stick with FormZ for now.

Haha3d · Post by **Haha3d** » Sat Dec 28, 2013 11:06 pm

I'm glad to find this topic as I was using TinkerCAD and they close down recently and was forced to look around shopping for CAD design s/w which was easier to use for newbies ... I downloaded Cubify Invent and found it very user friendly to design in 2D and then extrude to 3D. I would certainly recommend this to anybody searching for it, they have 14 day trial and then the s/w costs $49 to buy.

If there are any other ones which are similar to Cubify Invent pls share your thoughts ...

Cheers
Harsha

cj7hawk · Post by **cj7hawk** » Tue Dec 31, 2013 4:06 pm

Wow! I never thought there would be so much diversity in this, it seems everyone uses something different.

I use CorelCAD, mainly because of the price. I looked around a lot for an open-source product when I started and tried Cubify's software, but it just didn't seem precise enough.

I had a look at Solidworks, and after choking on the price, walked away. It looks great but is simply too much. I too needed to create solid parts that were waterproof ( I incorporate O-rings into a lot of my designs ) and I needed something very precise.

CorelCAD was actually a little out of my price range too, but I found that I could get it cheaper on Amazon than things like Rhino and it had a 1 month free trial... Then I discovered that it was basically Graebert Ares Commander, which also comes with a 1 month trial period, so that was another month of testing... Draftsight is a third version, which is free, but the free version doesn't have 3D modelling capabilities, though it can read and print 3D files. It just exports to STL which I load into the UP software.

CorelCAD is basically an autocad clone, though still lacking in some areas. The 3D modelling capabilities are all I use anyway, and although there's still a few minor bugs in it, I'm finding it pretty helpful. I usually leave about 100 microns between "tight" fitting parts, 200 microns for "loose" and 300 microns for thread clearances.

But it's not a very widely used CAD application, and not well known in the 3D world, so I thought I'd ask what others were using. I get the feeling Solidworks is the most popular, but they seem to want thousands of dollars for it -

Too much for hobby work.

Regards
David.

roller · Post by **roller** » Tue Dec 31, 2013 5:36 pm

I use CorelCAD, mainly because of the price. I looked around a lot for an open-source product when I started and tried Cubify's software, but it just didn't seem precise enough.

How is Cubify's software imprecise? I feel this way about Sketchup sometimes because all curves are horribly simplified instead of proper curves but I can live with this most of the time ... and it's why I switched to Rhino. What is Cubify's deficit that made you say that?

brad72 · Post by **brad72** » Fri Jan 03, 2014 4:05 am

Inventor 2014, but also playing around with Mudbox but need a third party program to convert the meshed models into an stl format

cj7hawk · Post by **cj7hawk** » Thu Jan 09, 2014 2:47 am

roller wrote:
I use CorelCAD, mainly because of the price. I looked around a lot for an open-source product when I started and tried Cubify's software, but it just didn't seem precise enough.
How is Cubify's software imprecise? I feel this way about Sketchup sometimes because all curves are horribly simplified instead of proper curves but I can live with this most of the time ... and it's why I switched to Rhino. What is Cubify's deficit that made you say that?

It just felt like it had to be driven by the mouse... There was no way I could see to input co-ordinates and lay down accurate parts, or control wall thickness or align parts where there wasn't a reference point. And now that I lay down a lot of high-accuracy threads (eg, ISO standard 0.8mm pitch), I am even more inclined to the belief that it's not suited to what I make.

It wasn't bad - it felt like it was far more suitable to a beginner. I was able to get somewhere with [img]Invent[/img] in a few minutes, while it took me a full day to learn to make basic shapes correctly under CorelCAD.

But I just didn't feel it had the precision for serious CAD applications.

Have you used it? I'd be interested to hear other opinions on it -

David

Astro · Post by **Astro** » Thu Jan 09, 2014 6:45 am

cj7hawk wrote:
roller wrote:
I use CorelCAD, mainly because of the price. I looked around a lot for an open-source product when I started and tried Cubify's software, but it just didn't seem precise enough.
How is Cubify's software imprecise? I feel this way about Sketchup sometimes because all curves are horribly simplified instead of proper curves but I can live with this most of the time ... and it's why I switched to Rhino. What is Cubify's deficit that made you say that?
It just felt like it had to be driven by the mouse... There was no way I could see to input co-ordinates and lay down accurate parts, or control wall thickness or align parts where there wasn't a reference point. And now that I lay down a lot of high-accuracy threads (eg, ISO standard 0.8mm pitch), I am even more inclined to the belief that it's not suited to what I make.

It wasn't bad - it felt like it was far more suitable to a beginner. I was able to get somewhere with [img]Invent[/img] in a few minutes, while it took me a full day to learn to make basic shapes correctly under CorelCAD.

But I just didn't feel it had the precision for serious CAD applications.

Have you used it? I'd be interested to hear other opinions on it -

David

Hi David,
Cubify invent allows itself to mm and decimal degrees to 3 decimal points and these values can be directly entered in by the user. I have used it to make parts for precision optics. Whilst Solidworks may offer more functionality, precision is definitely not an issue for me. in-fact I prefer it over solidworks. Cubify even has the ability to draw from a mathematical formula. Coordinates can be made and reference points added even offset planes and axis. There are tutorials on youtube that I found really helpful and sold me. I guess CAD's are a preference thing, and a new style of GUI can hide functionality.

Cheers,

Trent

roller · Post by **roller** » Thu Jan 09, 2014 1:50 pm

Astro wrote:
cj7hawk wrote: Hi David,
Cubify invent allows itself to mm and decimal degrees to 3 decimal points and these values can be directly entered in by the user. I have used it to make parts for precision optics. Whilst Solidworks may offer more functionality, precision is definitely not an issue for me. in-fact I prefer it over solidworks. Cubify even has the ability to draw from a mathematical formula. Coordinates can be made and reference points added even offset planes and axis. There are tutorials on youtube that I found really helpful and sold me. I guess CAD's are a preference thing, and a new style of GUI can hide functionality.

Cheers,

Trent

Your talk of parametricism (drawing from mathematical formula) caused me to take a second look at Invent ... now I look at it, seems like it might be largely derive from the old basic Alibre CAD which was about 5 times the price from memory (and acquired by 3D Systems). It was pretty good ... ipso facto I'm thinking I might need to give Invent some more time ... if it's basically Alibre then it's a bargain.