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Post by suctionhose on Jan 15, 2017 12:27:41 GMT
And you are right, we are all at different places, with different skills, resources and interests. The role of the computer in our lives and what it can do will vary accordingly. As a retired 68 year old engineer, I could not do without my computer anymore than I could without my over the yard arm beer at 5:00PM each day! I'm not using the computer all day like the kids with their phones, but I use it for ME stuff for an hour or so most days. Very true! I'm pleased the exact flavour of individual interests has been mentioned. I have generally found the CNC camp fiercely defensive of their choices - why I don't know as the skills, knowledge and tools, different as they are, are equally deserving of credit as any "idea to reality" exercise has ever been. (Buying a part is not making it but the maker is the maker using whatever tools he/she chooses) To the observer, there is often a standoff between Traditionalists and Modernists each trying to justify their legitimacy. I don't hold that view myself but I have felt some degree of ridicule from people when I say I don't want to change. There is this "force" these days that has people blindly computerising everything possible "because it must be better". Yes I'm cynical. Now that I've had a live taste of 3D, here's why it is unlikely to ever play a significant role in my model engineering: 1. It's a personal choice, but I want to experience the skills that created the prototype I'm reproducing. 2. I use computers but don't enjoy using computers. (They're a necessary evil with great benefits in certain areas...) 3. Use of 3D, unless I retool for it basically brings other people into my private space. It's personal time. Leave me alone! 4. The expense of making parts through hiring others' services is prohibitive in a model. (counter intuitive - is that the modern expression for "it doesn't make sense"?) 5. Outsourcing parts to others robs me of the opportunity to make them myself! I doubt I could finish a model relying on other people to do things. A) Cost & B) Time Anyway, I do feel model engineering is a very broad field. People within it's boundaries have many, many motivations - not always compatible - but equally deserving of recognition. I nudged the 3D subject to see what it's about. For my purposes I find it computer heavy with no sensible result. As you say there are different tools for different jobs.... What are you building atgordon if I may ask? |
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peteh
Statesman
Still making mistakes!
Posts: 755
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Post by peteh on Jan 15, 2017 13:30:38 GMT
It's interesting - I was a professional draftsman (2D town planning) for more than 30 years (retrenched last year  ) . I downloaded fusion and just can't use it. I am very fluent in Autocad itself but just can't get the hang of fusion for some reason. I have spent some 40 hours trying to create a beam engine in fusion and still havn't finished the first component (the beam). I think knowing the Autocad methodology of use 'cripples' the user of fusion, as it were. |
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Post by Roger on Jan 15, 2017 14:53:10 GMT
It's interesting - I was a professional draftsman (2D town planning) for more than 30 years (retrenched last year ) . I downloaded fusion and just can't use it. I am very fluent in Autocad itself but just can't get the hang of fusion for some reason. I have spent some 40 hours trying to create a beam engine in fusion and still havn't finished the first component (the beam). I think knowing the Autocad methodology of use 'cripples' the user of fusion, as it were. I'm not surprised at all by these comments. I looked at AutoCAD years ago and found it to be counter intuitive and just plain hard work to do anything. (BobCAD is like that too) I ended up with Imagineer 2D that was later renamed to Smartsketch and that's something that I might not use for years but pick up and use right away without effort. MY Brother-In-Law went on a long AutoCAD course and was telling me how wonderful it was, so I told him what my experience was and asked him to show my why it was so good. He'd only done the course a week or so ago, and he couldn't draw anything. These old AutoCAD products are utterly different to the new ones, and I suspect you're trying to bully Fusion360 into working the way those old ones work. It's hard to disconnect from those methods, but until you do, you won't get anywhere. I think you'll have an epiphany where it just clicks and then you'll never go back. I very much doubt if AutoCAD designed that new package, I suspect they've rebranded a licensed version of Solidworks, or something like that. |
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Post by bambuko on Jan 15, 2017 15:08:47 GMT
Fusion 360 is not free unless you are a student or an educator (or in my case a retired educator)... Perhaps this is the case in US? but here (UK) it is simply: "Free for startup, hobbyist and enthusiast Full use of Fusion 360 for as long as you need it ... Start by downloading the free 30-day trial" see: www.autodesk.com/products/fusion-360/free-trialAlthough as always... you are vulnerable to vagaries of corporate change of mind... (has happened before with other "free" products). |
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Post by Roger on Jan 15, 2017 15:38:56 GMT
Fusion 360 is not free unless you are a student or an educator (or in my case a retired educator)... Perhaps this is the case in US? but here (UK) it is simply: "Free for startup, hobbyist and enthusiast Full use of Fusion 360 for as long as you need it ... Start by downloading the free 30-day trial" see: www.autodesk.com/products/fusion-360/free-trialAlthough as always... you are vulnerable to vagaries of corporate change of mind... (has happened before with other "free" products). If you go to that page, it says... Get Fusion 360 for free for 3 years That's fine unless you start building a locomotive with it and then have to fork out for the full version to be able to finish it. It doesn't sound like such a bargain after all. The charges afterwards seem to be $25/month if you have a yearly contract, or $40 month to month. Whether that's just for the US or not remains to be seen, but I somehow doubt it will be different in each country, even if that appears to be the case now. The paid UK prices are here which are not overly expensive if you're running a business, but not very attractive to a hobbyist. Hopefully it will remain free for Students, but I somehow doubt it. |
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Post by bambuko on Jan 15, 2017 15:45:01 GMT
It always said this about student licence...
so no change
Look to the right and read again:
"..."Free for startup, hobbyist and enthusiast, Full use of Fusion 360 for as long as you need it ..."
It works the same as free DraftSight licence - you renew it every 12 month
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Post by Roger on Jan 15, 2017 15:53:44 GMT
It always said this about student licence... so no change Look to the right and read again: "..."Free for startup, hobbyist and enthusiast, Full use of Fusion 360 for as long as you need it ..." It works the same as free DraftSight licence - you renew it every 12 month Ah, I see. It does seem that the business model for software these days is geared towards renting the use of software to guarantee revenue, rather than the selling of a license, with optional 'maintenance' to have access to support. My accountant wants me to switch over to the system he uses which is like that, but I prefer to pay once and use it forever unless the operating system doesn't support it any more. I find that route much less expensive in the long run. |
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Post by bambuko on Jan 15, 2017 16:04:48 GMT
Yeah,
that's the system...
"Free" licence has some limits - you can only use it while online, there are limits to cloud storage etc, etc.
You can btw save your files locally as a backup.
I suppose old(2D) Autocad was as popular as it was because vast numbers of people were using it (majority from pirated :-) copies). so this time Autodesk seems to have decided to corner the market by making it available to startup, hobbyist and enthusiast (in a hope I guess, that if our project makes it commercially we will be already hooked on product).
Having said all this, I totally agree with you about "... pay once and use it forever..."
You only need to ask people who used Alibre, where it all ended up :-(
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Post by Donald G on Jan 16, 2017 8:24:05 GMT
Thanks to advice on here, I downloaded the program yesterday. Have signed up for the student - hobbyist and, as said above, now have it for 3 years. For my 2D I use Draftsight which, as mentioned requires you to re register annually, this has not been a problem. I started to use Draftsight just after it was released and so far no problems.
Yesterday I managed a simple 3D sketch, so now reading the tutorials to pick up more useful information.
Donald
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Post by suctionhose on Jan 16, 2017 10:08:10 GMT
I found a few YouTube by beginners useful
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Post by Donald G on Jan 16, 2017 10:11:28 GMT
Yes exactly Ross. I am lucky and have 2 screens so have the 3D on one screen and run the video on the other, watching, stop, do that small piece, then continue like that till you produce what they show.
Donald
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Post by suctionhose on Jan 16, 2017 11:26:12 GMT
A grandfather sat next to my this afternoon as we waited for our children to finish gymnastics. He plonked a HEAVY textbook on the table titled "Underwater Robotics".
He was designing a remote control submarine. Why? That was his hobby.
As a retired computer engineer or similar, 3D design was instinctive for him. I showed him my 2D Ploughing Engine design and the 3D I was playing with.
We were amused by the realisation that we'd come at our respective projects from completely different angles. He was designing his 'ideal' machine knowing from 3D files someone will be able make the parts and I was designing my parts specifically to be made in my garage.
A moment of insight there into the "free thinking" facilitated by 3D design.
We discussed the likely cost of making a prototype of his "free thinking design" as he conceded it would be very expensive. So much so that he had bought a commercially available product to gain practical experience first.
I found it ironic that the "blue sky" thinking, innovative as it may be, ignored the "budget". My engine is no innovation but making it on a tiny budget sure is!
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Post by atgordon on Jan 17, 2017 1:39:57 GMT
... I have spent some 40 hours trying to create a beam engine in fusion and still havn't finished the first component (the beam). I think knowing the Autocad methodology of use 'cripples' the user of fusion, as it were. Can you PM me a DRW file of the beam that you were trying to put into F360? F360 has a wonderful "Screencast" recorder feature that allows a user to create a step by step drawing process video, complete with voice over: the file it creates is an actual drawing file so you can then try out the steps in real time too. I'm not a F360 expert, but I have managed to draw everything on the S/Simplex without too much trouble (the cylinder block was a bit tricky ... it was the second item I created and I really had to move away from a 2D view of the world to create that item). I also agree with you that familiarity with Autocad (or 2D) does not help one bit as you move to Fusion (or 3D). The approach is very different, and you do have to start from a different place than with a paper drawing view of the world. I wish I was eloquent enough to come up with an analogy that made sense: the best I can do is that I now have to have a "big picture view" of the part I am hoping to draw whereby I try and visualize the part on the screen and how I would start to create the overall shape by extruding from a simple 2D drawing ...  |
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Post by atgordon on Jan 17, 2017 2:15:05 GMT
... I very much doubt if AutoCAD designed that new package, I suspect they've rebranded a licensed version of Solidworks, or something like that. For a number of years, Autodesk has been developing its own 3D modeling package entitled Inventor. This was a significant move away from the AutoCAD (2D) approaches of the past, and much closer to ProEngineer (now Creo) and Solidworks in that is is a true 3D environment. It also creates 2D output that integrates seamlessly with AutoCAD (but while we at this juncture, a word of warning: you can "read" the 2D output from the 3D packages in a 2D system, but there is no way to go from an 3-view detailed orthographic 2D drawing and then create a fully functional 3D model from your 2D masterpeice in any of the 3D CAD systems .... put your entrepreneurial hats on guys, if you build such a system, they will come in their droves, to misquote the unseen voice in the "Field of Dreams"). In the light industrial CAD/CAM world (the non-Catia world), there are a few big players: ProE/Creo has a fully integrated CAM package. Solidworks "links" with MasterCAM for the CAM users. Inventor has an add on separate Autodesk CAM package entitled HSM that seemlessly integrates with the base package. Fusion 360 looks like an improved and easier to use version of inventor + HSM. I met a Fusion 360 sales person at a vocational education conference last March and he indicated that Autodesk was allowing the Fusion team to plough their own furrow and to become a full service 3D CAD/CAM package: they don't plan on stopping Inventor developments, but the roadmap for the CAM side of things (the old HSM package) is all Fusion 360. Word of warning: this was a 10 minute "I'm starting to learn F360, (a) is it going away anytime soon? [NO] (b) are you going to gouge me - a free user - in the future once I get hooked [NO], and (c) is it going to be developed further? [SEE ABOVE]" conversation, and with a salesman, not a product development engineer. |
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Post by atgordon on Jan 17, 2017 3:06:17 GMT
... What are you building atgordon if I may ask? The longest. slowest build of a Super Simplex ever undertaken! As well as making parts for local small British car owners (for beer and brats), and finishing the chassis off restoration of my 72 TR6 which has a lot of custom parts designed with help of the TR6 forums and made by me (rear disk brakes, rear telescopic shock system, plus a lot of other smaller home brewed custom parts including electric power steering). I also make custom parts, mostly using CNC, in stainless steel for local luxury cruising and sport fishing boat makers (nice when someone tells you "I need you to make those two hawse pipes for less than $50,000!). I never planned to get into this business (I literally met a guy in a pub!), but it is technically very satisfying and entirely 3D CAD based - their drawings come to me in 3D CAD format. The downside is the parts are all complex 100 hour plus operations! Hell, I retired in 2009 and didn't plan to be working this much! I enjoyed your mention of your 3D Epiphany with the retired engineer ... 3D CAD is a tool makes my life much easier. Like all tools, it has a learning overhead. In some cases, the work being done doesn't justify the learning overhead, and maybe it is simpler to use Blackgates or Reeves drawings (or your own back of a fag packet drawings). If you want to see how things really work, then 3D CAD can have a rapid payoff. On the Super Simplex, the motion bracket as drawn doesn't work ... you could draw it out in 2D but I'm not sure you would "see" how everything fits together in a way that helps determine a solution. In 3D CAD, it really helps to be able to bring all the parts together on screen in an assembly that shows how the locating brackets for the crosshead slides have to be modified, and in such detail that you can come up with an improved solution rather than the "Oh sh*t, it doesn't fit, what do I file off or juggle to get it to work" approach that often plagues our work when we have made everything and the parts are on the bench, and we're trying to fit it together! Cheers, Tony |
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Post by suctionhose on Jan 17, 2017 3:41:55 GMT
Tony,
Thanks for that. You're not idle then!
If you own the production stream end to end as you seem to (as does Roger Frank and others) then one step links to the next and costs are controlled. Even better when they are recoverable from a client!
My manual methods have grown up in much the same way. Within a size range, not too large / not too small, they have been extremely versatile.
With industry shrinking in Sydney and former associates retiring, the supplemental specialized skills like heat treatment and gear cutting, even materials are getting harder to find.
Humans adapt. Old ways are lost then often rediscovered with much enthusiasm. That is the cycle.
I guess I'm characterised by methods that have never let me down. Hard to move away from something that has served so well.
I expect to finish both pairs of rear wheels for the ploughers this week. Been a day a week for 8 months, 10000 individual steps including hand forming 1152 rivets!
A long job but can't replace the satisfaction of working with my hands!
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jasonb
Elder Statesman
Posts: 1,188
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Post by jasonb on Jan 17, 2017 9:24:19 GMT
Ross I am not quite sure why you seem to have totally dismissed 3D design just because you will be making the parts by traditional methods. I'm much the same as you in that I like to use my tools not just watch them make swarf but I do use a 3D package to design the models. It gives me the ability to easily alter a part at the click of a mouse and those alterations will carry through to any assemblies of multiple parts. I can assemble the parts on the screen and see how they work by actually turning the crank round and seeing how the conrod, eccentric , valves, piston etc move, if any parts clash or need adjustment that can be done all long before I even cut into stock. From the 3D model I can print of traditional 2D drawings and work from those not just send them off to be laser or water jet cut or printed, CNC cut. Any changes to the drawings during construction are easily altered and then the drawings can be shared with others electronically. I have also used them for the occasional water and laser cutting but 99% of what is drawn in 3D gets made on manual machined DRO excepted. This is an example of an engine I drew and assembled in 3D, but machined manually from the 2D drawings generated from the 3D modeled parts modelengineeringwebsite.com/Jowitt_engine_build.htmlJ |
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Post by niels on Jan 17, 2017 11:56:33 GMT
Life is short and there are many steam locomotives to understand and improve. No harm as steam locomotives are dead as dodos. One of my favourites is shown here in 3D www.12-ladouce.com/en/the-12004.html#dassaultNo Belpaire and taper |
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Post by suctionhose on Jan 17, 2017 13:00:18 GMT
Ross I am not quite sure why you seem to have totally dismissed 3D design just because you will be making the parts by traditional methods. Jason, I've been thinking about this since you posted a few hours ago. I must say I'm pleased we are having this sort of discussion and have managed to avoid the usual old vs new bashing. I confess to be fascinated by people's motivations in all walks of life. Some interests / obsessions entice me to "try something" to gain a deeper understanding of what people like about it. Why do people climb mountains? So go with them and find out. You might love it. You might hate it. But at least you'll know that about yourself. I know now they feel something spiritual and powerful when they climb and I don't! You have to try it to find out... So 3D. In this instance I hoped it would give me effective access to a foundry again. It didn't. It sounded expensive and problematic so not a positive experience this time. I got to thinking then about how many mock ups, cereal box templates, etc I have made over the years and concede there might be an opening for 3D there. But at this point I can't even imagine drawing a traction engine wheel in F360 nor can I imagine any benefit from doing so! It says a lot about a person's brain and how an individual becomes conditioned to thinking. I know this about myself that I get bored "planning" and really want to be "doing". The nature of my professional project plans has taught me to leave options open and not get too detailed too soon. I'm best at smaller poorly defined scopes and I believe I have a talent to see a lot of detail in my minds eye that others do not. Dependencies, pitfalls, sequence of events and critical milestones are immediately obvious to me. I think Model Engineering has honed that to a fine art and differentiates me from my tertiary trained colleagues. My strength professionally (I was self employed for 20 yrs) was to be handed a box of broken bits, "How soon can you fix this? The machine's down..." I had more success than most. No drawings. Just a brief on what it did and I'd sort it out. The standard was "to be at least as good as the original" And so it was usually with only the most basic workshop practice. My models are mostly made up in my head as I go with little interludes on the drawing board to check a few things . Loco's and traction engines are not conceptual designs. We are constrained by the reality of the prototype so the overall concept is already defined. Even the Double B McLaren TE was a "design" although once the basics were done, I quickly tired of following drawings and made it up on the run. I would have said something similar about 2D at the start. I remember saying to the 2D course teacher, "OK, I can draw now but how do I work up an idea with this?" Work required basic 2D. Soon it replaced the board at home and now I can draw in bed and email jobs to Jim to do across town. Definitely a step change with improved functionality. Maybe 3D will follow the same route. Well see..... Here's a hand made wheel for good measure....  |
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Post by Roger on Jan 17, 2017 14:33:18 GMT
Hi Ross,
That's a stunning piece of work, it's a pity I'm too far away to be able to drop by and see it.
Personally I see nothing wrong with pin jointed cardboard mockups, cereal boxes for patterns and such like.
The key to all of this is motivation, and each of us has a different one. It's easy to overstate the usefulness of CAD when a simple job won't benefit from it. For me, the end to end connection you mentioned provides a step change to its usefulness. For me it makes sense to use it for everything, so I then have full documentation and backups of everything I've made. So you'll find me drawing a washer with a few clicks for that reason rather than just grabbing a piece of bar and making it, even though that's a manual turning job.
Without a CNC machine requiring an output, there's not such a strong argument for CAD in my opinion. Looking at your wheel, there are only two things that jump out as CNC jobs to me. Those are the spokes and the hub, both of which use blends of curves and straight lines. The rest doesn't really benefit much from that approach.
It's a handy tool to have in the locker for designing things like sliding fire door linkages, so I think it's worth having for those sort of things. It's also good for drawing geometric shapes and then using it to find key dimensions. In the end, it's only a tool, albeit a powerful one. They make some things that are very difficult to do conventionally very easy, but also can make simple things to make conventionally unnecessarily long winded, especially if you don't know the software well.
Each to their own, but I'm pleased that you've taken the time to find out enough to know where it might be useful if something comes along where it would help. Knowledge is power, after all.
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) . I downloaded fusion and just can't use it. I am very fluent in Autocad itself but just can't get the hang of fusion for some reason. I have spent some 40 hours trying to create a beam engine in fusion and still havn't finished the first component (the beam). I think knowing the Autocad methodology of use 'cripples' the user of fusion, as it were.
