greenramp
November 5th, 2011, 08:13 AM
I see more and more of you guys doing your own fab and design. Although not necessary I do believe in designing with CAD before mocking up in card board.
A good example of this is that not everyone has a plasma table / cutter. You may hack at a piece of steel for hours with a sawzall, die grinder, nibbler etc.. and get what you want. You can expedite the process by handing a template to someone that does have a plasma table but the cost associated with them modeling it is high. If you could hand them a file for them to use to cut your part the cost is cut in half virtually. STEP/IGES are the most common files associated with someone that is going to import for machining or cutting.
all of this being siad not everyone has the opportunity to use Autodesk Inventor or Solidworks. Google Scetchup is the answer and you can download it here (http://sketchup.google.com/)
If you are somewhat familiar with computers and have a basic knowledge you should be able to run it. if not you can always check out the tutorials here (http://sketchup.google.com/training/videos.html)
as well as youtube videos.
there is also a 3D warehouse that you can download files created by others and also contribute to this for them to use here (http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/)
I have attached an image of a bumper from the warehouse that someone has contributed, it shows you just how intuitive it can be and save you some time and money (I hope)
I am not into the home / landscape part of designing but the program can also help in this field.
Who knows maybe there is also a future in the CAD industry for one of you that learns and masters this program.
A good example of this is that not everyone has a plasma table / cutter. You may hack at a piece of steel for hours with a sawzall, die grinder, nibbler etc.. and get what you want. You can expedite the process by handing a template to someone that does have a plasma table but the cost associated with them modeling it is high. If you could hand them a file for them to use to cut your part the cost is cut in half virtually. STEP/IGES are the most common files associated with someone that is going to import for machining or cutting.
all of this being siad not everyone has the opportunity to use Autodesk Inventor or Solidworks. Google Scetchup is the answer and you can download it here (http://sketchup.google.com/)
If you are somewhat familiar with computers and have a basic knowledge you should be able to run it. if not you can always check out the tutorials here (http://sketchup.google.com/training/videos.html)
as well as youtube videos.
there is also a 3D warehouse that you can download files created by others and also contribute to this for them to use here (http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/)
I have attached an image of a bumper from the warehouse that someone has contributed, it shows you just how intuitive it can be and save you some time and money (I hope)
I am not into the home / landscape part of designing but the program can also help in this field.
Who knows maybe there is also a future in the CAD industry for one of you that learns and masters this program.