Looking for the best free CAD software I can get, and I know there is a free version of fusion 360, but I also know its somewhat limited. Therefore, is it better than freecad?
Also, if its neither, what is a good free cad software?
I am able to work autocad pretty easily because of classes I took in highschool but now that I’m not able to use it for free I’m looking for an alternative so I don’t have to pay that much.
Just getting into CAD, and got myself FreeCAD, but now Im wondering, is it good? I can't and don't want to spend anything on CAD, but I don't know if FreeCAD is good.
I'm running Fedora 35 on my Dell XPS 9360. It's still a pretty fresh install, so it's mostly the out of the box experience. Yesterday I installed both FreeCAD and Cura, and they both seem to have a similar visual glitch. I tried to capture it in a screen share here. The issue is a lot clearer in Cura, but in both programs it seems to be that the non-3d parts of the interface disappear sporadically. It seems to be triggered by moving the mouse over the buttons.
I don't believe it's a hardware issue with 3d acceleration, since Civ 6 runs fine, as does Tinkercad in Firefox. I'd suspect it could be a bug in whatever GUI framework these programs use, but I'm not even sure which one that would be.
I haven't really found anything that looks similar online. Has anyone experienced this? Any pointers are welcome!
What's FreeCAD's relationship with Rust language?
I've speculated that Rust could be a modern language to implement CAD in, but since there's a lot of work behind FreeCAD already, then I don't know what kind of investment are we talking about here.
I have the following part I've imported into FreeCAD as a mesh, but when I slice it on CURA this thing has some errors. So I imported this into FreeCAD thinking I can fix this. So when I create a part from Mesh it does not recognize this as a shell when I try to create a solid. Disclaimer though, I did model this with Sketchup first a long time ago before discovering FreeCAD. Any way to get this thing to mesh correctly after using Sketchup? What would be the most "efficient" way?
https://preview.redd.it/307dk39hsl881.jpg?width=1315&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c14067201bc7f8f7c4dabc83cafcb083609eaa02
Sorry if this has been asked before but I couldn't find much information on it. Title pretty much says it all. If anyone can give me some help on this i would really appreciate it.
Other info: i have a model that is currently an stl. I'm trying to convert the stl into a STEP file. I've done it before in the past but not with this fine of detail. I'd like for this process to go faster if possible. My plan is to eventually turn my model into a mold so I'd like to preserve a decent amount of detail.
Hello,
I am looking for something similar to generative design/shape changing in Freecad, I want to start with something changing from straight line to arc and then to different shapes using genetic algorithm, does anyone know how to do that?
Ok so i want a tool (or set of tools), that can help me create a non-dependent copy of selected bodies across a defined datum plane. I don't want them to be dependent so draft clone doesn't work for me.... and the part design design mirror seems to have.... issues.... Can anyone help me with any tool they know that does this, so far I have (unsuccessfully) tried :-
1)using the copy-paste -> transform option in the combo view
-
draft clone in drafts workbench
-
mirror features in the part design workbench
Im open to downloading new workbenches is anyone knows something
Thanks in advance
I'm trying to build this triangular support, and would like to create a polar array around the Z axis to duplicate the extrusions 3 times at 120 degree intervals. I imagine I've done something to mess up the feature hierarchy, as its not like anything I've ever used before.
This is version 0.19,
Rev 24291 (GIT)
OS Win 10 Vs 2009
Any help, or tips to build parts in the future so that they show up properly, would be much appreciated!
I posted this a few days ago, and it's never appeared on the subreddit.
This is the part I have in my hand.
Measurements. The belt that will go into this is a GT2, 6mm wide, and the single width grooves are 1.86mm thick. The base of the mounting plate is 3mm thick, so the grooves need to be 9mm deep.
The big box opening is 2.5mm thick by 9mm deep by 4mm long.
The flat on the bottom is 1.86mm thick by 9mm deep by 7.4mm long.
The angle on the top is 1.86mm thick by 9mm deep by 8.2mm long.
I'm not worried about matching the actual length here, I want to get the opening and the belt loop correct, and the thickness so my belt will fit.
This is a gantry mount for a 3d printer. The part I have in my hand (picture above) sticks away from the gantry too far, so my designed part has the belt loaded in from the gantry side instead of the open air side. If that makes sense.
Here's a link to download what I already have in fcstd. I'd really like instructions, instead of just a finished part, so I can learn how to do this for myself next time.
https://www.filemail.com/d/snojtdoaqpfjqjg
Thank you for any help.
I'm a Third Year Mech student and in this semester I had to use CAD software for completing few subjects (will also need in future).
I am really thankful to all the people who have posted videos of FreeCAD on YouTube and especially the developers who have made the application.
I completed all my 5th semester with FOSS and FreeCAD was a major part of it. Props to my professor of the CAD course who not only told us about the alternatives to Fusion or Catia but also encouraged us to use FreeCAD (tho I was only one in the class to use FreeCAD) :(
But anyway that's all, I just wanted to show my appreciation to the Devs and community. :)
Am looking forward to contributing to the project in near future :)
I can basically get a picture of the paper notepad I physically made and if I could put that photo into FreeCAD and just dimension that then I think this could work great.
I think the manufacturers would like this better too. For now I would mostly be communicating with overseas suppliers.
I have a dual boot and freecad runs 10-100 times slower than that it in windows. Is there any setting or something I could change it to run faster? Both systems boot from the same SSD.
Edit: It looks the problem was the with the snap packaged version. Installed from this PPA and it's functioning normal: https://launchpad.net/~freecad-maintainers/+archive/ubuntu/freecad-stable
Thanks to u/SpamBadger and u/cincuentaanos
Hi everybody, first of all I want to apologize if my english is bad but it isn't my first language.
The reason why I'm trying to learn FreeCAD is because I need something to sketch some simple projects of some furniture I want to build with wood. Right now I just need to assemble basic shapes, nothing too fancy. Also another objective of mine is to learn how to make those simple shapes 3D printable in case I need it.
I started searching for tutorials on youtube but I felt overwhelmed by all the different types of framework that FreeCAD offers and being a complete novice without previous experience in CAD I really don't know what I need to learn.
What do you guys suggest me to do/learn first?
Thank you in advance!
Hi there,
This issue was probably reported for a long while. Once a file gets bigger with many bodies and features with references to a spreadsheet, each edit to the spreadsheet takes quite some time. I use a single spreadsheet. I think that FreeCAD tries to update everything upon changing the spreadsheet. Perhaps, would it be better to use a reactive programming approach? I know this from R Shiny (R library, a data analysis programming language). But the logic is simple and could be useful for a dependency graph. Let's say we have 5 objects (A, B, C, D and E).
C depends on A and B
E depends on D
A keeps track of C. Once A is updated, A reports this change to C and C gets recomputed.
D remains idle as E doesn't report anything.
(Small note: in R Shiny this is only done if C gets called e.g. displayed and C actually asks A and B if there are any changes. Such calls propagate through the dependency tree. I guess this model wouldn't work for FreeCAD.)
So a reactive programming approach should reduce the recompute time... Only relevant objects get recomputed. I wonder, what others think about this?
I didn't see a SW Vault like feature for FreeCad and I couldn't find anyone working on something like this. I want to try to help, admittedly I might be the worst person to do this but I'd rather fail then complain.
I saw the FreeCad GitHub documentation for developing but does anyone know of a good video tutorial to check out or if anyone has tips I'll take those too.
Like the title says... Freecad 19.3 was working fine about a week ago. I tried opening it yesterday and it gives me the splash screen, goes through loading, launches a window that is completely blank, only has a title with[not responding] and a close X. Any ideas?
In the past I had issues with it launching while other python applications were open, but AFAIK none are open.
So i use freecad at work to produce .step files for manufacturing aswell as 2D PDF drawings and a lot of people here as asking for training, so ive decided to make a step by step series of videos highlighting the process and the features I use (Mainly part design and techdraw).
Its intended for people with no experience in 3D modelling. This is just part 1 on making a basic box in part design. Later videos will go into more depth.
Any feedback would be greatly appriciated.
