| Open Source CAD [message #8442] Sun, 20 December 2009 09:19 UTC |
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I've been using Blender to design stuff, but while it is good for characters and objects, it's not good for mechanical parts. Does anyone know of a good free (maybe opensource) CAD for designing mechanical parts?
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| Re: Open Source CAD [message #8445 is a reply to message #8442 ] Sun, 20 December 2009 13:07 UTC |
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I've looked around, and there is no open-source solution for real mechanical design. There are free CAD programs out there that will work for hobby projects, but nothing too complicated. try e-machine shop to get an idea.
If you need real CAD you can get it for about 10% of the cost of a high-end package and still get the exact same functionality, without some specialist features you probably won't need anyway (you probably won't be making molds). I picked up Alibre Design and it works great for most tasks.
Aaron - 40westdesigns.com/blog
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| Re: Open Source CAD [message #8500 is a reply to message #8442 ] Tue, 22 December 2009 19:23 UTC |
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I use Blender for mechanical modelling.
When I first tried mechanical modelling in Blender I found it very hard. You have to do things slightly differently to how you would in something like Autocad. You often need to make temporary geometry as a construction aid.
Learn how to use shift-S for positioning the 3D cursor and moving/scaling relative to the 3D cursor.
This tutorial helped me out :-
http://www.rab3d.com/rab3d/tutorial/608/tutorial_608-1.html
Regards,
Ian.
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| Re: Open Source CAD [message #8502 is a reply to message #8442 ] Tue, 22 December 2009 19:57 UTC |
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What about the Maya Educational use only demo? If you print something it'll say demo on it, and you may not be able to export to required formats, but might get you something that you can switch to blender or truespace to be able to export into a required format.
The Mad Moder
michael@shapeways.com
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| Re: Open Source CAD [message #8604 is a reply to message #8504 ] Tue, 29 December 2009 16:17 UTC |
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| artmaker80 wrote on Tue, 22 December 2009 21:56 |
I found this qcad. I work at the office on autocad, and qcad look very similiar. Its open source
http://www.ribbonsoft.com/qcad.html
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It's not open source!
You can download a demo or buy it.
The demo version terminates after 10 minutes.
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| Re: Open Source CAD [message #8605 is a reply to message #8442 ] Tue, 29 December 2009 16:33 UTC |
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Wow I think that qualifies as the shortest lived demo ever.
The Mad Moder
michael@shapeways.com
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| Re: Open Source CAD [message #8747 is a reply to message #8442 ] Tue, 05 January 2010 18:39 UTC |
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just to clarify, the Qcad demo shuts itself down every 10 minutes. Apparantly that's the only difference compared to the full version.
It is a 2D CAD program tho. I didn't realise until I tried using the demo.
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