Anyone taught themselves CAD?

I have no idea how to use CAD software and will need to soon. I did technical drawing in high school and used to do 3D modelling as a hobby, I have no other experience that may be relevant. Is this something I can learn in a few evenings or something I'll have to read a fat book to get started with?

I'll use any FOSS CAD app.

I want to get some 4age crank ladders and a custom ITB adapter "virtually complete" around the middle of next year.

You should be able to mostly get the hang of it in a few evenings, the software might also have a small tutorial built in. Based on my experience, the more advanced feautres will require the book or the internet to explain, as the software will ask for references or prompts and they need to be done a certain way that isn't explicit. The book/internet solve that though

I did a six week Solidworks course (3 hours once a week) that got me up to speed on the basics. I wont count the hours I did at home.

Truth is, the book would have done as well if I had the disclipine. Solidworks for dummies is an option.

Once you get started, YouTube is your firend for just about anything you can think of.

Do you need to learn because of your job or because of your hobby? If hobby, then you wont want to cough up the 4-5k it cost for Solidworks (or maybe you will?)

Google Sketch-up is another option that is free and supposedly easy enough to learn.

I learned Solidworks myself on-the-job with no books in a few weeks. It's really easy. I think Pro-E is similar in learning curve. Something like UG takes a few good training classes to get useful information out of.

I want a parametric solid modeller and a good book but Solidworks is too much $ for me to berkeley around with. Even if I learn it - I'm never sinking a couple grand in to buying the product. I looked at Alibre too - cheaper but not cheap enough and even bought a copy of ViaCAD 3D v8 for $90. I never put the time in to really get comfortable but I did draw up a couple things that made me think it was close enough for what I'd need.

I had a drafting class in college, was a traditional engineering drafting by hand course, and the associated lab for the course was AutoCAD. This was around '01. I picked up a student version of AutoCAD LT (2002 I think) and with what I learned in the class I used on my own and for several other drafting programs.

I designed a lot of stuff with AutoCAD, eventually through an associate of a friend became a "freelance CAD/drafter." I taught myself BobCAD and their CAM suite to get a business up and running. BobCAD is cheap but you get what you pay for, they may have improved since '07-'08 but it was really, really, horrible to work with after coming from a "real" drafting program like AutoCAD.

My freelancing turned into a full time gig, and Solidworks '07. Having some drafting background helped, but really using the tutorials in Solidworks most computer savvy folks could eventually figure it out. I did buy a couple books, but I was already beyond the vast majority of what the books had to offer. I did all engineered drawings and CNC programing for a small metal fab shop in NWA for a little over 2 years thanks to that one class, and a friend.

Basically if you can grasp a drafting program, you can figure out any of them. Especially if there's a tutorial or two to work with. Between the built in tutorial and Youtube I don't believe there are many books that could provide a better education for something like Solidworks.

• Lee

I found them to be easy classes, easy enough I could have taught myself without much difficulty with the help of a book. I know inventor pretty well and enough CATIA to get myself in trouble. As I recall, I did the bulk of my assigned Catia work over a weekend in the lab towards the end of the semester, as everything assigned was due day of the final.

With that being said, LEARN 2D CAD FIRST! Doing everything in a powerful 3D program is easy, but the world runs on Autocad because its cheap, and learning autocad's a bitch if you already know the easy route. I went Inventor>Autocad>Catia and wanted to kill myself doing the autocad work.

If you or someone you know works at/attends a University, or sometimes just has a .edu email, you can get the student/teacher version of some of the drafting suites at a significant discount.

There's usually a catch, like a 2 year license, water marks, or the student version isn't compatible with the full version.

Depending on your scruples, and torrent abilities, there are other... options. Not condoning, but would make learning a high end program a little easier to stomach.

• Lee

Learning it as a hobby. Solidworks is not only too much $, but I don't want to make myself dependent on any proprietary apps. I don't want to cough up $4-5k for any software for sure!

I remember I spent some time looking through the options for FOSS CAD apps, installed the one that seemed like the best option on my laptop, then opened it up...and had no idea what to do. Maybe I'll take another look at that.

I bought TurboCAD to do CAD work for exhaust manifold flanges. It is really easy to use and not very expensive. It will also write out any format you'll ever need.

I'll try that if I can't find anything FOSS that I can figure out, but I'm really trying to stay on that. I remembered the one I tried earlier was BRL-CAD. I think I might even have an early 2000s edition of TurboCAD in a box somewhere.

For learning 2D CAD first, maybe QCAD Community Ed.?

http://www.ribbonsoft.com/en/qcad

Another good free 2D CAD package is DraftSight.

http://www.3ds.com/products-services/draftsight/overview/

It's very similar to AutoCAD, and I designed a number of the DIYAutoTune.com products with it. From what I hear, the makers of SolidWorks cooked it up after Autodesk broke something that was being used to pass AutoCAD drawings into SolidWorks and took a long time to fix it. So the SolidWorks team decided to get a bit of revenge by putting together a free AutoCAD clone. Not sure if that's true or not, but it's plausible.

I just installed and did the 1st tutorial for FreeCAD. It's 3D solid modeling capable and seems pretty easy to use. I can see how I can use it to start working up simple things right away.

http://www.freecadweb.org/wiki/index.php?title=Getting_started

Huh I think I'll give that one a try as the first 3D CAD, it has buttons that give you some idea what they might do!

I took drafting in junior high and again in college. As in, sit at a big tilted table with pencils, T-squares, and stuff.

15 years later, I learned AutoCAD mostly by OJT. I'm glad I had the T-square version first. I use IntelliCAD now, mainly because it was free and uses the AutoCAD commands. Also, my CAD work is not very demanding.

My engineer son got to go straight into Inventor or some such in college. Pretty cool, from what I could see.

GameboyRMH wrote: Huh I think I'll give that one a try as the first 3D CAD, it has buttons that give you some idea what they might do!

I like the way it separates functionality into different editors. That way there are not 3000 options you can't use on this.

So far, it works - but I still haven't done anything like try to specify a thread for a hole.

I don't need to specify threads with any of the things I need to design. The crank ladders are a good first object to work on, the ITB adapters have a complex shape but no threads needed either (in fact I'm at least going to try to run a 3D-printed plastic model...hey it works in FSAE right?)

Taught my self AutoCAD. The key is having a project to use it on. Doing lessons is boring but if you are trying to actually get something done it is motivation to learn. I just stepped in to the 3d side of AutoCAD and it is fun. Did some modeling of a complex section of a foundation to show a contractor that it can be built. LOL

AutoCad is THE industry standard. Check out their website, download the free viewer or the student set. That will give you a idea of what it is all about. I have used it everyday for over 20 years.

In some industries AutoCad may be the standard, but I see a lot more companies using SolidWorks for solid modeling.

I learned using the student version of SolidWorks and a book called "SolidWorks 2006 tutorial" by David Planchard. I was using AutoCad at the time, but to make the move to medical devices I needed SolidWorks.

If you know someone who is a student, teacher, or has kids in school you can probably get the student version of SolidWorks. The student version used to be under $100, but only had a 1 year license.

I took half a semester on Solidworks back in college. It was pretty easy then.

I have a legitimate seat of Solidworks on my work laptop and another seat at home. I use them both for drawing parts up for the Corvette, planning garage layouts, and general nimroderry. I use Solidworks daily at work to draw up parts the engineers are too busy to make, modify parts, and since I do a lot of the casting design, copy our competitors parts to have made at our foundry.

It is harder to learn to use the vault than it is to learn Solidworks, in my opinion. Its also hard to fix someone else's models, especially of castings with draft and fillets and whatnot.

93gsxturbo wrote: Its also hard to fix someone else's models, especially of castings with draft and fillets and whatnot.

I encounter this sometimes at work. Fortunately, our group has some standards on how we go about doing things. If we didn't it would be a mess.

I've been using SolidWorks for a variety of purposes for 10 years. It's simple to learn the basics, difficult to master. I am finding it to be extremely common in industries like engineering and product design.

It's expensive, to be sure. It's also very powerful software. If you want a cheap/free version, follow the architects and go with SketchUp. If you find that you need more, move up to Rhino. If you really are interested in SolidWorks, see about getting a student version. It's pretty cheap (~$150, iirc), and you can learn a lot from it.

I was pretty much self-taught in AutoCAD starting around 1999, and moved to SolidWorks around 2002. I was lucky enough to be given a seat when I (the sole SW user in the company) was last man standing in the US when they downsized and moved to Canada. The disgruntled (deposed) former CEO was only too happy to write the letter I needed to give my reseller to have the seat transferred to my company.

I do enough consulting annually to offset the cost of keeping curent - about $1200.

I've seen plenty of people teach themselves via the included tutorials, and all the mainstream CAD programs have them.

But the way to distinguish yourself from 90%+ of the CAD jockeys, is to understand manufacturing process, machining and materials to help design easily manufactured (or simply manufacturable by any means) parts. Also, thinking ahead when modeling - using good design intent - so that likely changes in the part can be effected with a design table or a simple dimension change without the model self destructing.

I'm too tired this sec to list my fave tips, but I'll try to come back after the weekend and add maybe 10 bullet points of stuff I've learned I use every day that really makes stuff easier and better.

PowerSHAPE-e is the educational version of PowerSHAPE and it's a pretty powerful CAD program. I was given a 4hr lesson and then learned the rest.

I wasn't starting from zero. I'd years of training in other CAD software. Once have one CAD system down learning another is easy if you keep and open mind and are willing to learn.

@ motomoron you are spot on with your comment about what distinguishes the top Designers from the rest.

I've heard good things about http://usa.autodesk.com/autodesk-123d/ , but I haven't used it yet myself..

I will say, that I work for a major player in the CAM system world, and I wouldn't recommend the "liberating" method... All of the main software companies know more about you than you think if you use an "slighty-less-than-legal" version of the software. If your computer is connected to the internet, that is.