Drawing.

Ah so it is you who has stolen and imprisoned my granite ball!

I must admit...like you I don't have a decent drawing package..I end up doing 2D drawings using my Printed Circuit Board layout software (Don't tell the others Kris... I'l get teased mercilessly.. I bet Blink has a super dooper Cad system ... probably even got one in that cool trike of his! (^{and another on his katamaran}) )

Del

mmyummm mmyuumm. tickles under that lickle collar coochy coos.

It's probably kens cutting floor program I found. The stuff on the advert looks way good. Sirk is currently sleeping so you're safe for the moment. he he he.

What happened to the wondrous days of doodling on the backs of cigarette packets and beer-mats.. The recent Challenge Question by Fyz prompted me to look into this. I had a most marvelous solution but it would not fit into the margin. trueSpace looks like it has potential, but I have yet to decide if it is worth the time (hence my threat to all that scanned doodles may be the result of apathy). Maybe I could do it really and am just keeping quiet for fun (), but a nice 'easy to use' package sounds appealing. I have zero shame so the only way is up. Failure to educate me here could be drastic.

>>I end up doing 2D drawings using my Printed Circuit Board layout software

Yeah, and in this job I'm doing schematics in "SmartDraw." It's funny how the worm turns...

And these guys think Spice comes from Indonesia. Although a couple think Arrakis...

I'm all for fag-packet (that's a Basildon term for a cigarette carton) drawings myself. I've quite a collection.

What a coincidence! Yesterday, I was considering doing the same thing!

Looked at the Auto desk Inventor, great package, but what a rip off! I've been using 'paint' to do all my drawings and even though it takes a long time and is not designed for this type of work, I get some good results! ( check out the pic!) I know, it's not a very technical drawing but it serves its purpose!

If you have any joy with trueSpace3.2, could you let me know, as I'm looking to go more technical,reason being, my latest prototype (not the lathe project!) needs some complex 3D drawings doing with lots of curved surfaces and 'paint' is not the way to go!

Whatever happened to first and third angle, orthographic projection????.... I even believe the orthogonal came in somewhere!!!

All those good plans, elevations and end elevations. I even used to be able to do the drawings and manufacture components from these drawings?????

That piece you did with 'paint' is great - it does the job fine. trueSpace looks like it has good potential, especially for 3D - it does some nice graduated colour fill, and the way objects can be morphed and textured is probably useful. The interface is not very intuiutive (to me). It's a freebie so you might like to explore it too. Some time over the next week or so, I'll try and post something up to illustrate.

It's quite good fun in paint, If you get a whole bunch of drawings in 1st or 3rd angle, you can cut and paste to create all the assemble drawings and the like but as I said, it is a long process! a very long process!(unlucky for me, I have a passion for accuracy!) I would love to be able to find a program that I fully understand (like 'paint' LOL) I will have a play with trueSpace too if I can download it from somewhere! I'll check out the web in the morning.

I am also interested in hearing about a good drawing program for non-cad type folks. I too have been using MS Paint for doing drawings. You're right Truman, it's slow and tedious but it does get the job done. Since I don't have a regular need for a drawing program, I can't justify spending bucks to obtain one.

Same here!!

Paint has it's disadvantages... I do NOT like the way one does circles, and I need to have a calculator on the computer desk. But, if I can live with .008 inch resolution (120 dots per inch with my printer), I can design a part, print a copy of it, and use the copy as a drilling template.

For example, I need to make 100 shorting bars which are made from 1/4" x 1/2" aluminum bar. These are approximately one inch long, I (using paint) will construct a template to both saw each shorting bar from the original aluminum... lets say 10 at a time... and I have to allow for the width of the saw blade.

I then (using Paint) print out umpteen copies of the drawing, paste the drawing(s) to the Al and go ahead and cut it into pieces. I also have drilling centers in the print for the next operation.

In any case, you can do some pretty good machining using nothing but MS Paint.

Sincerely

Bill

I do the same for sheet metal parts using Inventor, the advantage is that Inventor will work out all of the bend allowances & corner notches & develop any holes etc that are across fold lines. I can print a 1:1 copy & fix to a piece of sheet metal and be pretty confident that I will end up with a part that works.

As 3Doug says in #76, it's horses for courses, also, each user will tend to favour a system they are confident in using.

I hope that doesn't mean I'm stuck with 'Paint'!!

Ah, what a Tholian Web you weave.

Look at Turbo CAD, which is free, but only 2D. Turbo CAD 3D cost some money, but it is nominal.

Thanks - I'll check it out.

I vote for TurboCad as well. I've been using it exclusively for years for 2D drawings and it has an excellent .dxf (AutoCAD) file converter. Very user friendly and very intuitive to learn.

As a designer, I HAVE to use AutoCAD & Inventor ............. Yes AutoDesk Rip-off $$$

I miss using FastCAD - Cheap and simple and gets lines on Paper - Very quick ... but

I have got my 10 & 15 year old sons drawing in Google-SketchUP ... a FREE product with a couple of functions and features supressed for the $495 - Big version ...

It does heaps ............ good place to start, free download -

http://sketchup.google.com/product_suf.html

Ideas on it's drawing power & Google connection -

http://sketchup.google.com/examples.html

It is not just for buildings - search the web ... lots of designers use it for idea stage work and concepts - GREAT quick 3D - for dummies 5 commands and you off drawing ........

Enjoy ............ Macker

How about Alibre? The basic version is still free.

I had a quick play with this earlier today - it looks really good. The tutorials and library downloads make it very user friendly. Thanks Macker (and all the others who have shared info/knowledge). I now have to make time to have a decent play with some of these packages. Hope others have picked up some useful stuff on this thread as well. Having the tools to visually present an idea is of really good potential use.

If you're interested in creating three-dimensional landscapes and more real life things, as well as animating them, I suggest Bryce. It's affordable, very easy to use, intuitive, and very powerful. You might want to check it out.

Thanks vermin. Fractal landscapes aren't on my agenda yet, but it may come in handy to know of. This thread had generated enough leads to keep me busy forever (It must be a conspiracy to shut me up !). Hopefully others will spot something of use for their own interests as well.

OK, well f#*k you and the horse you rode in on!!!

I have used AutoCAD, Inventor and Mechanical Desktop. I do like ACAD because of its power, but that power comes at the cost of a lot of complexity. One plus for ACAD is the large user base means lots of help online. And speaking of help, the help files are vastly improved, and they even have animations to show you how to do things.

I'm not so happy with Inventor. I am used to using grips and object snap tracking, and Inventor doesn't like them. It also automatically constrains everything, which can be a time saver for those constraints you want, but a hassle when it adds a constraint you don't want. I prefer Mechanical Desktop because it does work like ACAD.

As far as posting images here, I make sure the background color of my drawing is white or some other color that gives good contrast with the item, then I use Print Screen to copy the image onto the clipboard. I paste it into Paint and save as a .JPG picture. Then I open it in my photo editing software and crop away the Windows frame. If I intend to use several images in a comment, I'll bring them in before I start adding text.

I might check out that Google Sketchup for simpler 3D images, and leave Inventor for more complex shapes and assemblies.

I do most of my drawing on Powerpoint. I've tried out Google Sketchup and it's nice for 3D but my learning curve is a bit too long for my taste. I've been able to make pseudo 3D pictures on Powerpoint but I do that rarely anyway. I was disappointed with Powerpoint 2003, however. It has a glitch that they don't seem interested in fixing. I've reverted back to Powerpoint 2000 just because of that.

I'm like you Vulcan, not that I do many sketches or drawings. I try to find a suitable drawing on the web. If I cannot I will usually draw it in Powerpoint.

Something I especially like about Powerpoint is that I can define links to other pages (slides, actually). Like when I made a Powerpoint version of one of our electrical panels.

At the first page was a Table of Contents. Click on one of the items and you're immediately brought to that page. If you want to see the coil of a relay contact, just click on the page reference next to the contact and you're there!

On another project, I drew a P&ID (Piping & Instrumentation Diagram) of one of our processes. When you click on an instrument, it takes you to a page that tells you what instrument is installed there, the specific brand and model, the medium being measured, the stock number of the spare as well as the shelf location in the stock room. Another click and you get a list of the configuration parameters.

I did this as a demonstration only in an attempt to get Engineering to adopt this for all our drawings. Impressive as it was, they had already invested a lot in AutoCAD to abandon it. That wasn't my intent as AutoCAD has it's uses and capabilities. Still, they didn't buy into it (Surprising since they didn't need to buy anything! Powerpoint was part of every computer in the Factory!).

You can add links to AutoCAD as well.

Sketchup has a mass of downloadable components to use ( mechanical fittings etc). It's a bit beyond my learning curve to demonstrate at present.

Hi Kris,

........ This is Vince cox's over unity engine: I drew it in Rhino cad very quickly then did a screen capture. The download version of Rhino lets you save drawings 50 times (I think) before you have to register and pay: so I just don't save anything. The user interface is brilliant and simple. It's only $1000 if you do want to buy the full pro version.

http://www.rhino3d.com/cad.htm

For 2D stuff I don't think you can beat the free version of Turbocad: TurboCAD LE

And the later (3D) paid for versions are very cheap:- £60 ($120) for version 12 :- http://cpc.farnell.com/jsp/Computer+Products/Software/UNBRANDED/TC12+DELX/displayProduct.jsp?sku=CS14128&_requestid=34217

What ever happened to etch-a-sketch and napkins?? The kids these days just don't know any better!

I have been using CADKEY for years, but it's now called KeyCreator and recently bought by Kubotek. It's very easy to learn and use. You can find it here: http://www.cadkey.com/

For simple drawings, it is immaterial, what drawing tool we use as long as we could conceive the figure / model mentally.

For some (born engineers?) it happen in their mind just like that. Many learn and practice successfully. Some struggle to get the idea…

The following is an example:

These are Front view (elevation) and Top view (plan). They are one and same figure, a small squire inside a big squire.

The question is what is the side view? (had there been some hidden details, they would been shown as dotted lines).

It is very interesting quiz, if you have not come across so far.

We use Macromedia Flash for making wonderful sketches with beautiful colors and animations. But for manufacturing you need serious cad packages.

It might also be a flat plate with two square holes punched into it and ben into an L.

OR, it could be a flat rectangular plate with an aspect ratio of root2 to 1 with a rectangular hole in it of similar aspect ratio, the thing leaning at 45deg.

Paper is in short supply. Like many other things.

Disagree with your first idea but the second works as long as the hole....no wait, disagree with that as well! sorry Stan said something about hidden detail! The first won't work (in my opinion only) because you would see the thickness of the edge! It could not be tapered either because you would see the inner corner at the bend and lots more detail for the holes!

See if you can guess what this is?

The drawing is innaccuratley placed in veiw. The hidden line of the upper prtion of the window is missing in the top and front views.

It also appears that there are some issues with true length of lines since front veiw part is angled away, the lines should not be the same length in front and side veiws.

They were a bit hap hazard so I've recalled all the product range and re issued!

Shall we increase manufacture by a further 50% ready for the Christmas rush?

If only the global supply engineers were so timely with thier corrections and pleasant in thier responses.

cr3

Gold Block eh!! A pipe moment.

Indeed

I can see the outline of a piece of equipment, i.e., a plate with beveled ends and a hole, also beveled. However, I do not see one dimension nor do I have any idea of what angle the bevels are cut, they could be 40 degrees to 60 degrees even though they look to be about 45 degrees. But whether the block is 2 cm by 2 cm by 1 cm or 2 km by 2 km by 1 km is anyone's guess. What good is a drawing if it is not dimensioned?

Bloody hell chtank, it's a fictitious part which is only there to show that the part our good friend Crabtree described would not meet the criteria laid down by Yesyen!

This is a working drawing that I made on Powerpoint. Imagine the fabrication shop owner asking for a copy for his AutoCAD operator. His jaw dropped when he learned it was a ppt file.

"Darn! I could have saved thousands of pesos by using that instead of buying AutoCAD!"

Please excuse my sloppy alignements for now. This does not give an answer to the question (no dashed lines etc), but I felt like a quick play. Sketchup is fun to move around a viewing angle with. I will endeavour to improve my extrusions !

( the small squire is in the bottom LHS - just kidding with ya )

Hmmm...I see the squire, but why do you show that box thing? It's distracting.

I totally agree with you on the collaboration format for CAD programs chtank, but who would benefit on this thread with a drawing covered in dimensions and intricacies that will never be used? For me, The picture (because that is all it is) only shows me that the program yesyen used to produce the drawing may in-fact be worth looking at for a home based project where large amounts of funding may not be available! The programs used in industry are designed for industry and used by industry with industrial prices! The programs I use to do my designs are an aid to me and the people I want to communicate my ideas with, If I had a spare few thousand pounds then I would go and buy a professional program that uses the platforms of industry, for example autocad!

Your comment 'Don't give me just a few lines of a story, give me the entire story! Hey, guys and dolls, we are engineers (I think), we were taught how to read plans (I think).' although being valid leads me to the point of information overkill! When the information is needed to produce a product, it is given, this is a stage drawing, they can be from basic concept to a full portfolio with production notes, but my example earlier of the plate with the hole did not justify dimensions because it was only for illustrative purposes where tolerances, dimensions and material specs were not deemed useful to man nor beast! If I had put the aforementioned information on the drawing, would you have rushed out and made one? hell no!

Hopefully this thread will give a good balance between industrial programs and home use programs! For me, A very useful thread with a cross section of ideas! You seem to be commercially orientated and I can see your point clearly but would you spend $5000 on a program that you use only now and again in your house?

Point taken! The new blood should be encouraged to get hands on experience with the industry standard packages as you so rightly pointed out! But Engineers come in a variety of shapes, with a variety of backgrounds and resources. It would make life much easier if we all had the same software, but we don't and that's where the complications start! A 'drawing' program is only as good as the person pressing the buttons! If you don't know how to do a technical drawing in the first place, the machine will churn out rubbish! These 'home' programs are good for time served engineers because they are familiar with the industry and know what information is needed! Remember when we did drawings on tracing paper? We had no computers so you made darn sure you did a good job with all the relevant data! I still do pen and paper work because it keeps the mind active! (and I enjoy it!) Maybe the new blood should be encouraged to do real drawings as well as the computer generated drawings!

As for your Earthbound Spacestation, An excellent piece, thanks for taking the time sharing it with us. Here in Southern Spain, things are starting to change for the better. More and more people are looking at alternative forms of power, me included. So keep up the good work and it's been a pleasure

"Remember when we did drawings on tracing paper? We had no computers so you made darn sure you did a good job with all the relevant data! I still do pen and paper work because it keeps the mind active!"

Remember Irish Blue Linen? Remember ruling pins and ink? Remember laying a drawing over blue pring paper in the sun and counting, then putting it in a sealed tube and dropping in the ammonia? If you can remember that, then, baby, you are my age, ehhehehe. We would even wash used old blue linen drawings and make shirts and handkerchiefs. In fact, our wife (I would say wives but that would have to include our mistresses that were allowed back in the olden days) loves to make their blouses out of Irish Blue Linen, they were quite sheer and made the gals look lovely.

Showing your age now eh! I have seen a few of them drawings but never made any! I can just see it now, my wife in a shirt with a exploded view of a clutch assembly on her back! LOL! That really tickled me! When I started walking down that path, I was made to redraw all the production drawings for the factory! It was a great time for me because the company was evolving and we had to be on the ball so to speak! One day it would be drawings for a pick and place unit, the next day would be a quick lesson in why my drawing was rubbish! So you see, I was thrown in at the deep end but learnt to swim pretty quick! Nothing like hands on is there!

And think of the thrill and sense of pride to see your designed product as it was trucked out the door and down the street.

Nothing better eh

Wow!! that brought back some memories. I have never had to produce a new drawing on linen but I've had to modify a few. I can remember carefully scratching the lines away & re-drawing in ink. They used to take an age to go through the dye-line printer.

It is an attractive presentation style drawing. But I agree it is of no use for manufacturing. How much is the software (in U.S.)

How about BOM's? What about exploded/assembly drawings? How about views? I like what I see. Tell me if there is more please.

It is a nice drawing though.

cr3

for autocad, type autocad in google and for other software, do the same with the name of the product. For qcad, type qcad in google.

Try this page for a selection of free CAD programs

"The question is what is the side view? (had there been some hidden details, they would been shown as dotted lines)."

Drawing the TWO possible side views is duck soup.

The hard question is: "Can you draw a mental picture of the object in words only."

Answers next week or confirmation of solution soon after it is posted.

With no hidden lines in the two views shown, the only possible solution I see for rhe third view is an inverted "L" with a line thickness (or material thickness) of zero.

Bill

Can you do us a drawing?

Sciesis2

"With no hidden lines in the two views shown, the only possible solution I see for rhe third view is an inverted "L" with a line thickness (or material thickness) of zero."

Mr. Truman Brain

"Can you do us a drawing?"

YES per my Post #38. There are two possibilities!

1. Cut a piece of 45 deg. wood molding 2" x 2" x 2" long, 1/2 of a cube.

2. Cut a piece of 45 deg. wood molding 1" x 1" x 1" long, 1/2 of a cube.

3. Center the 45 deg. face of the 1" half cube in the 45 deg. flat face of the 2" half cube.

Now almost anyone can see that the second solution it to cut out a 1" x 1" x45 deg. Recess in the 45 deg. face of a second 2" x 2" x 2" half cube.

QED!

I use autodesk inventor as well, and I must say I hate it. I miss using solidworks. But I work in a facillity where I'm technically not supposed to even be doing CAD drawings due to the local union and its draftsmen. So, I usually take my good CAD drawing, dumb it down so it doesnt look professional, and paste the thing in MS Paint or Powerpoint with SKETCH written on it in big letters.

I've used Solidworks and Pro-E in the past when the job paid for them. Now that I am in a job that has little need for CAD, I have found that Alibre is not bad (mainly since it is free). I think it is a little clunky, but I designed a playhouse for my daughter so that I could estimate my lumber needs prior to beginning. The worst thing about it is that you can only use either 5 or 10 pieces in an assembly when using the free version. So I just made it as a single part and got around that problem. I was disappointed that I couldn't make each face a different color (it made the whole part the same color). The drawing side of Alibre wasn't too bad either. It was pretty simple to drop in new views and add dimensions.

Not bad since it was free.

I tried Rhino and wasn't sold on it. I know I have read of others who really liked it. Now I plan on giving trueSpace3.2 a shot.

darn, I forgot to 'submit' my answer, so here is a list of links the answer contained:

truespace

autocad

GIMP

Blender

QCad

You will find that trueSpace and Autocad are Windows only applications, truespace requires active X. GIMP and QCad are Windows and Linux. Blender is Linux only. GIMP, QCad, and Blender are open source and freely available for download.

MY "forgot to submit" answer also contained an analysis of these application. I have (own?) and have used all of these applications except for trueSpace.

Hey, nice informative post chtank.

I've often purchased PC magazines to find there's a giveaway disk stuck to the front and on a couple of occasions there's been a CAD package included. Try a few newsagents!!

Like somebody else already mentioned: Alibre Design Express download for free.

I personally use Mechanical Desktop, Catia V5, and Solid Edge for work, but sometimes start my models in Alibre because I think it is very intuitive to operate.

Check it out!

Man, what was I trying to say with this?

I use CadStd for 2D drawings. Mostly wiring diagrams of how my studio equipment and interconnects are wired up. Having some college experience with auto cad it was easy to use CadStd and alot faster than using paint (which I have spent many hours using as well). There is a free version and of course a professional version which can be purschased, www.cadstd.com. As for a 3D cad the only thing I used many many years ago was a copy of Brice2 which was awesome for the artistic aspect of 3D design also very expensive. I lost that 'copy' that was donated to me many years ago, sadly. I miss the 48hour renders of Brice on a pentium pro 200 LOL.

Try Turbo CAD they have a deluxe version that relatively inexpensive for what it can do. You can download a trial version. It's not hard to use. Drawings can be done in 2D or 3D.

Sketchup is great, but, horses for courses: I know what you like doing when you're not winding people up on CR4. Try drawing a tomahawk or a circle tangent to two circles and a line in sketchup.

Believe me try the free 2D version of turbocad before they manage to scrub all traces of it from the web.