CAD software?

[Rumblestripe]

I've just read through the thread P4 - PO 1923 wagons (and other etch work) and very informative it is too. And I've read the related thread 3D printing class 25 parts which is also fascinating.

 

But neither of these threads mentions what software is available and the pros and cons. I know that "Simon Sr Blue" is using a package called "Blender". What I'd like to know is what software is available cheaply (preferably free) and how easy is it to use to prepare drawings for submission to photo etching companies. Blender looks to be too advanced for what I want as I suspect 2D capabilities are all that's required, I don't want to draw 3D (or even print 3D) but if the package is easy to use I suppose that in a few years time 3D printing might be more accessible than it is nowadays (a few years ago home photo printing was ridiculed!)

 

I have PCs running both Linux (Ubuntu) and Windows (Vista) so either OS would suit. Do I even need CAD software, would a decent vector drawing package do?

 

 

 

 

 

Note for admins, I have tried to search for CAD to no effect so please be tolerant if I have missed a previous topic. Ta.

[Stubby47]

Have you looked at Google Sketchup ?

 

Not sure if it's good enough for what you need, but it is free!

 

Stu

[ianmaccormac]

I'm using Macromedia Freehand 10 and Coreldraw 8. Both were free. Coreldraw 5 and Freehand 5 were free on Computer magazines years ago and I have bought upgrades. I think the Freehand one was 22 pounds, secondhand via Amazon marketplace and Coreldraw 8 I eventually bought for 10 pounds from Amazon itself.

I use both and convert the Freehand to Coreldraw to send to the etchers. Again, it depends what the etchers you are using can handle!

A lot of us are using PPD Ltd up in Lochgilphead, Scotland. I started with them about 8 years ago when I was drawing GWR Concertina stock, LTSR, SECR TPOs, Underground stock and a few other things for MARC Models. Mike was the one who got me employed doing these bits as I was off work being ill in need of something to concentrate on and had my laptop with my first go at a coach etch drawing at Chatham Show and he saw it and asked!

I stopped doing his drawings about 5 years ago when I got btter and went back to full time work. It was a great intro. Lots of help also came from Roger Chivers who I helped a bit with CAD/CAM and Vacuum forming to get started with - he then rapidly left me standing! Superb work!

So it doesn't have to be CAD, it doesn't have to be expensive. Just find the articles on line and in the magazines and have a go. It is not hugely expensive to try a couple of ends or sides of a panelled coach or whatever to see if you got the process correct, and the etchers are good at having a conversation with you. They are a business though and will need a proper order and prompt payment and won't be keen on a complete time waster.

I send in a few drawings to them each year. I have just drawn my first complete loco kit but have about 17 coaches of my own designs on my shelf above me as I write. Very satisfying! I've no layout though but am just getting to that after spending a lot of time doing the etching designing after lots of research. All very enjoyeable.

There are many articles on line. A danish one was the best but I can't find the reference at the moment but reading Craig Welshs recently, he mentioned Hollywood Foundry and there are good instructions there.

Cheers

Ian in Blackpool

[Jol Wilkinson]

Ian

 

If you want to produce artwork for etching or laser cutting, then a 2D package such as CorelDraw is what you need, Find out what file format the etchers require, CorelDraw is usually one of them. Avoid programmes that need conversion from one format to an other to provide what the final artwork requires. If you use a format that the etchers are familiar with, then they can easily correct any obvious errors you make.

 

I've designed a number of kits and a quantity of bits using CorelDraw 7 and 9. Later versions don't give any additional advantages for what I've found I need to produce "oven ready" artwork for the etchers. "Free" software usually has a hidden cost in terms of compatability, format conversion errors, etc. CorelDraw is fairly intuitive (other 2D packages may be the same) whereas CAD packages really need some formal training to get quick results.

 

Jol

[craigwelsh]

Cheers for linking my thread, very flattering . I have had a few pms about drawing package before..

 

I had access to Autocad so just used that in conjunction with the how to papers from Hollywood Foundry http://www.hollywoodfoundry.com/HowToPapers.shtm . Those guides allowed me to send artwork for a fold up sprung underframe to PPD http://www.ppdltd.com/web_site_3/page_1_intro.html in Scotland and it worked perfectly first time. It did take me a couple of months to get used to the copy between layer functions and lots of the shotcuts in AutoCAD to speed up.

 

If you look at the PPD website (sadly now more annoying than the old one!) there is a page about computer drawing and the formats supported. Im sending 2004 format dwg files to them.

 

I believe you need to be careful with line widths in Corel draw as they can make a difference but others will have to confirm that.

 

Warning though, you can spend more modelling time designing the kits than building them!

[simon br blue]

I use blender because it's free

 

I didn't know how easy it would be to get used to CAD software so didn't want to spend much money on it. A good thing with it being free is that lots of people have the same program and can answer questions about the program on the blender users forum. I found the best way to learn was to watch tutorials on youtube- you might want to look on there first to see what the program is like- to be fair I would guess that whatever program you are looking to use someone will have posted basic tutorials on youtube showing what it is capable of.

 

Simon.

[Ed Traxler]

Good evening gentlemen. First post here.

 

I use Google Sketchup. It is fully capable of doing anything that I need. Here is a Steam Pump I am working on ..

 

 

I created a loading platform in Sketchup. The photo below is a composite with the 3D view below and the Parallel Projection above.

 

 

From Sketchup I could then 'print' to CutePDF Writer and generate PDF files for various scales. I put them up on my blog .. Loading Platform .. where you can download the plans (such as they are) in N, HO and O scale. The nice thing about doing it this way is .. Sketchup is free, CutePDF Writer is free. You simply create the model full scale then print to CutePDF Writer as a 'virtual printer' .. and scale it. If you print with a 1:87.1 scale you can then have a plan in HO. If you print with a 1:76.2 then you have a plan in OO. Hard to beat.

[craigwelsh]

You have to buy the Pro version of Sketchup though (at £321) to export vector formats however . Its great for a quick draft layout idea but you can't etch off the free version.

[Ed Traxler]

I would like to direct your attention to a thread on the Westlake Publishing Forum .. "Using Google Sketchup and printapart.com". The OP is using a .stl plugin for Sketchup (free version) to export the data files for his models to be created in 3D resin

 

http://www.finescalerr.com/smf/index.php?topic=816.0

 

 

also a link to MakerBot .. instructions on using Google Sketchup and several alternative plug-ins .. to export .stl files

[martin_wynne]

If you are looking for a conventional CAD program, a very powerful 2D/3D CAD package which is entirely free* is: ProgeCAD 2009 SMART (Proge is in Italy)

 

It's based on the IntelliCad engine and uses AutoCad DWG/DXF as its native file format.

 

Bearing in mind the cost of other full-featured CAD packages, this entirely free version is excellent and much more powerful than most of the other free and low-cost CAD programs available. There are some nag screens about upgrading to the Professional version when you first select several functions, but they all have "don't show this again" buttons -- so you are soon rid of them.

 

*Free strictly for personal / non-commercial use only. Donations invited to http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org

 

n.b. for Windows7 -- before installing it, right-click on the installer executable and select XP or Vista compatibility.

 

Another very capable free CAD program is: free version of DoubleCAD

 

DoubleCAD is from the makers of TurboCad, and is intended to be a direct replacement for AutoCad LT.

 

If you know AutoCad and want a free program using the same interface, DoubleCAD looks to be ideal.

 

regards,

 

Martin.

[Rumblestripe]

Thanks for all the replies. I had looked at the PPD website after Craig had mentioned them in his thread and the reasonable quotes were enough to make me think about the possibility of using them for my own stuff. It seems to me that it would be pretty economical to produced your own models using a combination of "own brew" etches and resin cats. Looking further produced a torrent of information and no guidance! That is what you chaps are giving me here. What I wanted to avoid was downloading CAD software and then spending too long learning it only to find that it doesn't do what I want it do. I have used TurboCAD many moons ago so, I'm familiar with the principles of producing drawings with such software (I produced some turnout templates for EM).

 

Keep the tips coming.

[ianmaccormac]

http://www.ljungz.co...es/etching.html

 

This is the article I first read about drawing on the computer using Coreldraw. The guy, Tobias, is Swedish. Good instructions on the use and allowances.

I then copy onto two pages and make all the etching from the front change to black and that from the back go white on one sheet and vice versa on the other sheet.

So in effect I send PPD a neg for the front and for the back of the sheet that they just print and expose and etch.

By sending them it this way, they do no editing, or minimal, so it costs less.

HTH

Cheers

Ian

[ianmaccormac]

http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Fea1/601-700/Fea688_F-4_Greutert/00.shtm

 

And this is another where the guy is doing the etching at home. Shows the process and also the drawings on his screen to give you an idea about what we have been talking about.

HTH

Cheers

Ian

[Pugsley]

I believe you need to be careful with line widths in Corel draw as they can make a difference but others will have to confirm that.

Yes, that is the case with CorelDraw, all lines have a width to them, even the narrowest of lines, which isn't normlly a feature of CAD programs as AFAIK.

 

This can lead to the on-screen dimensions being slightly out in the case of shapes drawn directly, such as rectangles. Rectangles made out of 4 separate lines and then combined don't suffer from this, it's to do with the node positions on shapes versus lines. It shouldn't be too much of a problem as, IIRC, it only adds something like 0.015 of a millimetre but it has the potential to cause cumulative errors.

[Jol Wilkinson]

Yes, that is the case with CorelDraw, all lines have a width to them, even the narrowest of lines, which isn't normlly a feature of CAD programs as AFAIK.

 

This can lead to the on-screen dimensions being slightly out in the case of shapes drawn directly, such as rectangles. Rectangles made out of 4 separate lines and then combined don't suffer from this, it's to do with the node positions on shapes versus lines. It shouldn't be too much of a problem as, IIRC, it only adds something like 0.015 of a millimetre but it has the potential to cause cumulative errors.

 

Provided you set your line width to a low figure (CD12 has a "hairline" option) it isn't, in my experience, a problem. In fact, it can be an advantage because you can adjust the size of a complicated component up or down slightly by adjusting the edge dimension and colour (black or white).

 

Having done a certain amount of designing, as well as having some experience with others designers that use a variety of cheap or free CAD packages and having seen the problems they have, I wouldn't now use anything other than CorelDraw.

 

Jol

[Ian J.]

If you are looking for a conventional CAD program, a very powerful 2D/3D CAD package which is entirely free* is: ProgeCAD 2009 SMART (Proge is in Italy)

 

It's based on the IntelliCad engine and uses AutoCad DWG/DXF as its native file format.

 

Bearing in mind the cost of other full-featured CAD packages, this entirely free version is excellent and much more powerful than most of the other free and low-cost CAD programs available. There are some nag screens about upgrading to the Professional version when you first select several functions, but they all have "don't show this again" buttons -- so you are soon rid of them.

 

*Free strictly for personal / non-commercial use only. Donations invited to http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org

 

n.b. for Windows7 -- before installing it, right-click on the installer executable and select XP or Vista compatibility.

 

Another very capable free CAD program is: free version of DoubleCAD

 

DoubleCAD is from the makers of TurboCad, and is intended to be a direct replacement for AutoCad LT.

 

If you know AutoCad and want a free program using the same interface, DoubleCAD looks to be ideal.

 

regards,

 

Martin.

Digging up this old thread that thought it was nice and buried...

 

I have a question to ask re DoubleCAD, which is simply what would be the reasons NOT to use it?

[farren]

Can someone please put a list of some etchers so I can make some inquiries in to what programes they use and I can then work out which will be best for me. I have CAD pro 2013 at The moment but it has a time bomb and can't afford the £9.000 price tag. And would like something as close to it as possible with out cost

[Etched Pixels]

For the etching side you don't need much. Several of the free cad applications are just fine, and many people use standard vector drawing packages. Most etchers will accept a range of standard formats (usually including eps and pdf).

 

I mainly use PPD up in Scotland.

 

Alan