Alibre is back. The "grassroots" CAD

I got an email this morning from Alibre Design that a new version is available. They had been bought out by another company and renamed, but some of the former employees bought it back. I had let my maintenance lapse after the initial buy out. But I decided to give the new owners a shot and renewed.

https://www.alibre.com/alibre-llc-faq/

The price may seem a little high, but compared to other CAD software packages it's a bargain. I have the expert version because it includes sheetmetal design. Turning a 3D bent part into a flat pattern with the press of a button makes life so much easier.

For the occasional user, it's probably not worth it. But if you do a lot of fabrication, it might be worth looking into. You can draw the parts and just email the file to a local fab shop to be CNC plasma cut, waterjet, 3D printing, etc. and save some money since you don't have to pay the shop's hourly rate for the drawing time. It's also nice to be able to put the parts together in a virtual assembly to make sure everything fits together without any interference.

How does it compare with low/mid CAD packages like Solid Works and Solid Edge?

I may give the 30 day trial a shot one of these days just to check it out.  I have all the CAD access I need for personal projects, but if I want to actually make money off something I can't use them.  

Alibre CAD seems like a good step there, but it would have to be really good to prevent me from jumping straight to SW if I was basing a business off of it.

Interesting. I use Alibre / Geomagic for 3D work here at DIYAutoTune. It's very similar to Pro-E; I don't have much experience with SolidWorks though.

almost 10 years ago I convinced my employer to buy a few seats of Alibre for our machinists to use. At the time I was primarily a Solidworks user and Alibre seemed plenty capable, but a bit clunky.

Now that I am using the best of the best CAD packages every day I would have a hard time going back.

ProDarwin said:

How does it compare with low/mid CAD packages like Solid Works and Solid Edge?

I may give the 30 day trial a shot one of these days just to check it out.  I have all the CAD access I need for personal projects, but if I want to actually make money off something I can't use them.  

Alibre CAD seems like a good step there, but it would have to be really good to prevent me from jumping straight to SW if I was basing a business off of it.

I have experience with CATIA and Solid Works. The capabilities are similar to SW, but the interface isn't quite as nice. It cost half the price of a basic SW package, and the maintenance payment is much less (and not required). If you were planning on going full time SW might be a better option, but for a part time business Alibre would be fine.

I came here expecting cardboard aided design, not this fancy computer thing you speak of...

DISAPPOINTED!

Why would I buy that for $1000 when fusion360 is free and does sheet metal also?

Because Fusion 360 is only free for education purposes.  Making parts you intend to sell with the free license is illegal.

ProDarwin said:

Because Fusion 360 is only free for education purposes.  Making parts you intend to sell with the free license is illegal.

FREE IF

Startup: If your entitlement has been designated as “Startup, ” You may use the service if You are (a) a company, startup, or home-based business that generates less than $100,000 (or equivalent in other currency) per year from the total sale of goods or services, or (b) an individual using the service for personal non-commercial projects, hobbies, or personal learning.

I think most people would quality for this. 

Oh.  That's pretty awesome!

I feel like if you are doing more than $100k, you're in the range where you'll want a mid tier cad program anyway.

Isn't Fusion360 cloud based? I think that I'd prefer to have all my functionality and storage locally based.

Kreb said:

Isn't Fusion360 cloud based? I think that I'd prefer to have all my functionality and storage locally based.

Yes, it is. However that is how they are able to provide/support CAD/CAE/CAM all in one "free" package. That and they can follow your usage stats....

GambleGarage said:

FREE IF

Startup: If your entitlement has been designated as “Startup, ” You may use the service if You are (a) a company, startup, or home-based business that generates less than $100,000 (or equivalent in other currency) per year from the total sale of goods or services, or (b) an individual using the service for personal non-commercial projects, hobbies, or personal learning.

 

Can you tell me how to find this?  Searching their site, I can only find stuff about educators and students.

Kreb said:

Isn't Fusion360 cloud based? I think that I'd prefer to have all my functionality and storage locally based.

FWIW, the whole industry is moving that way.

In reply to Tom_Spangler :

Yeah thats how the software companies make money - its on the quantity of licenses you can have active per the company location at one time.

Personally I prefer some of the cloud based stuff in the professional environment.  Especially when you can ramp up/down number of users easily without the crazy initial purchase fee.

Additionally, the cloud based services seem to get updates/upgrades more often and there isn't a hard break from one version to the next.  When there is a hard break with other CAD software it always seems to be a hangup and prevent companies from upgrading.

I currently use NX 9 every day, and occasionally Keyshot 6 - we have/own the most current versions of both of these (11 and 7 respectively).  My entire MS Office suite is various levels of out of date.

Possibly stupid question, but if I were to invest the time to learn Fusion 360 for hobby purposes, but it was installed on a computer that's located at a larger business; would Autodesk assume that it was being used  for that business and make me pay? If I'm using it for my business, I have no problem paying the license, but as long as I'm just learning and playing with it, I'd rather not have to ante up. 

I would say yes.  I have heard of some audit issues in the past where someone who was taking night classes had a student version of software installed on  a corporate PC and the company was found to be out of compliance.

I see CAD as like learning a language. It's easy to pick up words and phrases, but fluency takes a commitment measured in years. As a guy in my mid-50s it's pretty daunting, but then a mechanical engineer with whom I work mastered Autocad well into his 60s so I don't really have an excuse 

In reply to ProDarwin :

https://www.autodesk.com/company/legal-notices-trademarks/terms-of-service-autodesk360-web-services/autodesk-web-services-entitlements

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/fusion-360-design-validate/is-fusion-360-free-indefinitely-if-your-a-hobbyist/td-p/6280628

Personally I don't really mind cloud based software, but the monthly/yearly subscription is what I hate.  I rather pay for it up front and have it forever if I chose to. I bought quickbooks desktop version for $150 and have been using it for 3 years now..or I could pay $30/month * 36months = $1080. For smaller shops $1000 goes a long way

I've half-started with a number of packages and not really gotten going... Are any of them particularly "weird", as in, if I invest time in learning Alibre or  Fusion 360, is one of them basically going to have trapped me because the understanding won't transfer well to another platform?

I mean, there's always some difference in different applications for a given task; just pop back and forth between Excel/Sheets/etc... But is there some amount of normalcy in how concepts are represented within CAD in general? Maybe I should go search for a "Learn me CAD" thread...

GambleGarage said:

the monthly/yearly subscription is what I hate.  I rather pay for it up front and have it forever if I chose to. I bought quickbooks desktop version for $150 and have been using it for 3 years now..or I could pay $30/month * 36months = $1080. For smaller shops $1000 goes a long way

Yeah, that type is annoying.    Some companies inplement it well though.  Solid Edge for instance is ~6K up front purchase and $1000/year maintenance/upgrade.  But if I were running a project where I needed to bring in 2 or even 10 temp guys, paying $230/month/seat is a damn good option.  Additionally, you can go from the $230 normal seat to the $329 premium seat for a few months only when necessary.

Personally, there is no CAD software I would be interested in having without also getting the maintenance and yearly updates.

Ransom said:

I've half-started with a number of packages and not really gotten going... Are any of them particularly "weird", as in, if I invest time in learning Alibre or  Fusion 360, is one of them basically going to have trapped me because the understanding won't transfer well to another platform?

I mean, there's always some difference in different applications for a given task; just pop back and forth between Excel/Sheets/etc... But is there some amount of normalcy in how concepts are represented within CAD in general? Maybe I should go search for a "Learn me CAD" thread...

Yes.  Some of them are weird.  For the most part basic parametric modeling is similar.  But not all packages are parametric.  Also, Siemens for example is pushing 'Synchronous' modeling a lot, which is like push/pull modeling (sketchup) had a baby with a parametric modeler (Solid Works).

But remember, a lot of packages cover more than modeling.  So while creating your part may be similar, assemblies, drawings, FEA, wiring, parts lists, etc. etc. are all different.  Sometimes its by pretty significant amounts.

Overall, if you are good at a mainstream parametric modeler, you can get up to 90% with another in very little time.  The last 10% will take a year+ though.