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View Full Version : Misc CAD 3D easy program to learn?



wannab20hatch
06-10-2005, 03:26 PM
Just as the topic says. How hard is it to learn and operate CAD 3D? Can the basics be picked up in a weekend?

Danny
06-10-2005, 07:47 PM
cad 3d?

i use Autodesk Auto-CAD AArchitectural Desktop everyday. if the program is good, youll never really stop learning. basics in a weekend? mmmm..... not sure.

i imagine its a cheap consumer program? if so, then yes, i see no reason you shouldnt be able to draw something by the end of the weekend.

wannab20hatch
06-10-2005, 08:57 PM
I need something that is more centered around mechanical.

Danny
06-15-2005, 04:13 PM
hm... not sure, i will let u know if i hear of any cheap alternatives to to AutoCAD for mechanical stuff. good luck, youll never get the functionality of Autodesk stuff, when looking in cheap software.

maybe you can find some reviews, on the Cad3d you speak of?? i will keep my eyes open

wannab20hatch
06-15-2005, 06:17 PM
I ended up buying Design CAD 3D max. its pretty cool and moderately simple to lern to operate. It was about 70 bucks.

Danny
06-15-2005, 07:58 PM
dang thats cheap. post up some screen shots of your drawings, and time it took you to draw it. i am interested in the productivity of a 70 dollar program.. cool beans, thumbs up :D

wannab20hatch
06-15-2005, 10:18 PM
Im still toying around with the 3d mode but when i get something complete ill definitely put something up.

Danny
06-15-2005, 10:50 PM
cool man, i never work with 3d stuff.

we have AutoCad 2004 and 2006, both 3d. But its uless, when we mostly drawl kroger stores. I am looking into AutoDesk Civil3D, now thats the hottness. But hurts the wallet at 6500$.

cant wait to see ur work man, good luck.

krindus
06-16-2005, 01:13 AM
in a weekend.... if you don't take your eyes off of the screen, maybe. it takes a good few weeks to get adjusted to a 2d cad system (with all the different lines, splines, and adjustments you can do, then learning the keyboard commands for them all). then addind an extra dimension to that.... all i can say is have fun.

tho, some systems out there, like QuickCad, are designed for people who don't have a lot of cad experience, and can usually be picked up pretty quickly (hence the name). but they usually take longer to do the same kinds of things, and don't have all the cool shortcuts.

Best of luck.

bicsintegra
06-16-2005, 02:24 PM
damn 70 bucks where did you get it? i have autocad 2004 i use at work and i have had it for over a year and i still don't know 80% of the functions on here. when it comes to 3d modeling pro engineer is the best software i have seen, they pay really good if you know how to use it. it is a more mechanical based software almost impossible to get on the personal market i only saw one person with it outside of a company. what r u trying to draw?

wannab20hatch
06-16-2005, 03:41 PM
I got it at micro center in gwinnett. Im making and designing my own throttle body, and when im done we are gonna CNC machine it at my work.

bicsintegra
06-17-2005, 07:35 AM
keep us posted to your progress i would like to see the finished project. my senior year at georgia southern we had to draw a engine in pro engineer (4-5) months of class work and extra help and sessions with the teacher. each team or group had a different part of the engine. the last week of school the professor uploaded all of our parts after he corrected somethings and fixed the drawings to spec. he put them on his computer and assembled the parts and aligned them to each other and then got the parts to move and the engine started turning and you could see all the forces acting on the engine. the program also told you expected life cycle, oper. temp., torque, h.p., it was incredible.

Danny
06-17-2005, 12:15 PM
damn 70 bucks where did you get it? i have autocad 2004 i use at work and i have had it for over a year and i still don't know 80% of the functions on here. when it comes to 3d modeling pro engineer is the best software i have seen, they pay really good if you know how to use it. it is a more mechanical based software almost impossible to get on the personal market i only saw one person with it outside of a company. what r u trying to draw?

hate to break the news, you'll never know 80%. I have been on autoCad, well i am 20 now, started when i was 15. so what, 5 years. Its fun, kinda, but i dont know 80%, exspecially 80% of all the new releases that autodesk sends us every year. lol......


post some screen shots of what u have done man!!!!

bicsintegra
06-17-2005, 03:04 PM
hate to break the news, you'll never know 80%. I have been on autoCad, well i am 20 now, started when i was 15. so what, 5 years. Its fun, kinda, but i dont know 80%, exspecially 80% of all the new releases that autodesk sends us every year. lol......


post some screen shots of what u have done man!!!!


i have been using autocad since 1997 when i was a intern and that was R12 and then R14 now i use autocad 2004 or turbocad R7. most of the drawings i do for my job are 2-d, i only recently got a book for autocad 2004 from borders books and it is huge. it will most likely take me a couple of months to get 3-d understood.

Danny
06-17-2005, 03:12 PM
good ol r14, yuck. never used r12, ur older than me..lol. i have worked with 3d in 04 based autocad. its ok, kind of a pain, and usless to say the least. (in our companies situation that is)

Jkuao
06-17-2005, 07:10 PM
Try Solidworks. If you're a student you can get it for like $100 and $200 w/ COSMOS, the Finite Element Analysis software. If you're not, a personal copy is 3-5k for the base version and retails for $27k for the full COSMOS version.

You draw immediately in 3D and its extremely powerful in terms of how quickly you can get the basics. Getting good still takes a while but the results are absolutely pro level. You can add SolidCAM(another 6k retail) to it and it'll generate machine code directly for a mill or you can just send the STL files for rapid prototyping.

It's really expensive if you're planning on doing real production on but the power you get is well worth the cost.

bicsintegra
06-22-2005, 07:28 AM
i will have to look into this even if it is just to sharpen up my resume.