CAD program NLC

[rdssdi]

I am considering a CAD program for home use. I have a new MAC OS X 10.6.2 3.06 GHz intel core 2 duo and 4 GB 1067 Mhz ram.

I have some experience with mechanical drawing but none with CAD. I want to create a mechanical drawing of my TVR space frame chassis.

Any suggestions?

Thanks and Merry Xmas.

Bob

[CBUEB1771]

I am considering a CAD program for home use. I have a new MAC OS X 10.6.2 3.06 GHz intel core 2 duo and 4 GB 1067 Mhz ram.

Bob,
CAD offerings for Macintosh are slowly becoming more available and useful. I have used Ashlar Vellum's Graphite program for a few years. This is a 2D drafting application. Ashlar Vellum also has 3D modeling products for MacOS. Ashlar's products are about the only serious drafting applications running natively on MacOS and they are expensive. I now have the same hardware and OS configuration you are running and have been using VMWare's Fusion to run Windows on a Macintosh. Autodesk now has some MacOS native applications and states that all of their 2D and 3D CAD programs run well with Parallels, which is a competitor to VMWare Fusion, also allowing Windows to run on a Macintosh. I imagine that the Autodesk's products for Windows would also run well with VMWare Fusion but perhaps they have a deal with Parallels that has allowed some optimization. Solidworks seems to be doing nothing with Macintosh, but here again their products should run OK with Parallels or Fusion and Windows installed on your Macintosh. I am happy with VMWare Fusion, it allows me to run MS Project and Visio without any noticeable performance hits. Of course this all means money. Fusion and Parallels are inexpensive, Windows 7 will add a few hundred US and any CAD application that is truly functional will run from 1,000 to 3,000 USD per seat.

[muir]

Hi Bob
I have been using AutoCAD on my iMAC (with the same specs as yours) for two years now with the help of VMWare Fusion and had no issues. It is not as fast as the same spec PC but I guess this is because the MAC is running two operating systems at once.
I use AutoCAD daily and found it too slow for everyday use so I recently purchased an i7 which works much smoother. If you were to use AutoCAD, it would work faster if you were to run Windows in bootcamp only. I wish Autodesk would produce AutoCAD for MAC.
I have been looking for an AutoCAD equivalent for MAC for some months now with mixed results as I would love to give PC the flick.
Let me know if you come across a good CAD program for MAC.
cheers
Muir

[rdssdi]

The sole affordable program for Mac that I can find is Turbocad.

As it costs much less than others, my assumption is that it is not very useful. I feel I would be better served with my drafting table and paper.

That is why I posed the question.

My additional thoughts were that a proper CAD program would calculate and generate a graphic of the tubes including all the angles and "fish mouth" joining details. As I have never used CAD software that may be unavailable or a feature with the high end products only.

Thanks

Bob

[CSICO]

Hi! I just came across your question regarding CAD programs for MAC. Actually I'm using TurboCad Mac DeLuxe on my iMac and it works ok for me. Mind you, it will take some time to get things right, especially with 3D drafting. However, why you d'ont download the free trial version of TurboCad, I think you get something like a 30 day trial and after that you can make up your mind. Here is the link:
http://www.turbocad.com/TurboCAD/TurboC ... fault.aspx
Hope this helps you for the moment.
Cheers
CSICO

[rdssdi]

Amazon has the Turbocad mac deluxe V4 for 75 USD.

With other cad software starting at 1400 USD, I don't see how it could compare.

It is probably worth a trial download. Thanks.

Bob

[theelanman]

revvit......

only if youve only got the cash...

please feel free to drop me a PM
I use all this lot all day everyday.......
I may be able to help

[CBUEB1771]

revvit......

Isn't that an enhancement to AutoCAD for doing material take-offs for architectural applications?

[MintSprint]

revvit......

Isn't that an enhancement to AutoCAD for doing material take-offs for architectural applications?

Revit (only the one 'v') is the architectural 'evolution' of AutoCAD. As I understand it, AutoDesk is moving in the direction of industry-specific variants of AutoCAD (presumably since it was getting too unwieldy to have one program that can meet the needs of disparate design disciplines, as functionality grew), and AutoCAD as we know it will eventually cease to exist - you'll buy Revit, or Inventor, ore whatever, depending on what your business is.

In the meanwhile - and I suspect the reason for theelanman's wink - 'cracked' versions of AutoCAD are available for free on the usenet or form almost any friendly CAD technician and can certainly do almost anything the amateur engineering designer would want of them (with the exception of stress analysis - you want 'Inventor' for that).

The problem is, AutoCAD (or Revit, or Inventor) doesn't run terribly effectively on the MAC, from what I've heard from everyone who I know who's tried it.

[theelanman]

big fingers gets me a double 'vv'

its not just architectural.......its a complete engineering solution....
what we now generate is a complete structural and architectural 3d model....including M&E, services, fire, etc etc etc.....and its so easy to spot when you have clashes and enables the 'complete vision' of the project...

[MintSprint]

its not just architectural.......its a complete engineering solution....

Sorry; by 'architectural' I meant to suggest that it's the version tailored to building design. I assumed that everyone would automatically recognise that us Architects are the only important people in the building design process: QS's, Structural/Civil Engineers, Landscape Architects and the rest are just there to pander to our whims and so don't need CAD platforms of their own.

It can hardly be considered to be a complete engineering solution, however - even for civil/structural engineering it can't manage things like drainage design and AFAIK structural analysis - our engineers use separate bolt-ons to deal with these functions.

It certainly isn't as well suited to mechanical engineering design (which is what the OP is after) as product like Inventor or even plain AutoCAD (for example, the current version of plain AutoCAD includes 'constraints' functions that allow you to articulate suspension linkages, whereas to the best of my knowledge these are omitted fromn Revit - at least on the last version I used).

Whatever... plain vanilla AutoCAD (the full version - not AutoCAD LT) will certainly do everything the OP wants it to do, but he'd be better off investing in a basic Windows computer to run it on, rather than trying to cobble something on top of the Mac OS, but if he wants an AutoDesk product that's specifically tailored to his needs, Inventor, not Revit, would be the one to go for..

[c.d.s.]

Hello Bob,

Is your end desire to make a 2d drawing of the TVR frame? I would tend to think from what I see of turbocad it seems to be well capable of doing such things.

There are some tube mitering scripts for autocad that I have seen, perhaps you can look on the turbocad forum and see if anyone has done one for turbocad.

Turbocad does import DXF/DWG (autocad) files, so you may find blocks for mitered tubes and then be able to import them into turbocad.

I would think that anything automatic as far as non standard connections of tubing, i.e. welded joints, would not be easy to find in any program once you get into circular tubing, I have personally not seen any program that will merge two circular tubes together and create a mitered joint, perhaps other members can add their 2 cents. If its square tubing, your stoked, dead easy.

If you are looking into just having flattened patterns for printing out miters for circular tubing, there are plenty of them online, most are windows based, but some are java based. I use this one often, thank the bicycle people.

http://www.dogfeatherdesign.com/ttn/

For drawing miters in cad, you will have to draw out the shapes in 3d (or 2d if you only need flat images) then just keep a little a catalog of 'blocks' for each mitre section and copy and paste on your drawing to suit. This will probably be the most unpleasant experience in drawing if you don't have any experience in cad design, but hardly impossible.



best regards


carl

[rdssdi]

Carl

Great information. Thank you. I wanted to start with a 2D rendering as the "top" and "bottom" segments of the frame could be easily drawn. The other connecting tubes and bracketry would be difficult and would be easier to visualize in a 3D environment.

One major interest in CAD was the possibility that it would calculate the mitered joints and add the tube outline. I was hoping that I could input the "centerline" dimensions and orientation of the tubes and the program would fill in the miters and tube shape. I was looking at a program by Bend-tech. It is tailored to tube bending and offers a 3D view of assembled pieces such as a space frame chassis. It is a simple view and it does not appear to show welds but may calculate angles. Although it would require additional software to run on a MAC.

I learned mechanical drawing in engineering schol in the early '70's. I do remember the basics. Some being intuitive. Zero CAD experience.

It appears at this stage that I will give Turbocad a try. It is inexpensive and should be usable for 2D rendering. With the additional mitering software I should be able to muddle through. It will be interesting.

Then there is the issue of printing it out in a large format.

Bob

[rdssdi]

Carl

Great information. Thank you. I wanted to start with a 2D rendering as the "top" and "bottom" segments of the frame could be easily drawn. The other connecting tubes and bracketry would be difficult and would be easier to visualize in a 3D environment.

One major interest in CAD was the possibility that it would calculate the mitered joints and add the tube outline. I was hoping that I could input the "centerline" dimensions and orientation of the tubes and the program would fill in the miters and tube shape. I was looking at a program by Bend-tech. It is tailored to tube bending and offers a 3D view of assembled pieces such as a space frame chassis. It is a simple view and it does not appear to show welds but may calculate angles. Although it would require additional software to run on a MAC.

I learned mechanical drawing in engineering schol in the early '70's. I do remember the basics. Some being intuitive. Zero CAD experience.

It appears at this stage that I will give Turbocad a try. It is inexpensive and should be usable for 2D rendering. With the additional mitering software I should be able to muddle through. It will be interesting.

Then there is the issue of printing it out in a large format.

Bob

[MintSprint]

There are some tube mitering scripts for autocad that I have seen, perhaps you can look on the turbocad forum and see if anyone has done one for turbocad...I would think that anything automatic as far as non standard connections of tubing, i.e. welded joints, would not be easy to find in any program once you get into circular tubing, I have personally not seen any program that will merge two circular tubes together and create a mitered joint, perhaps other members can add their 2 cents.

To be honest, I'd do it in AutoCAD by the quick-and-dirty method of drawing up the frame in 3D the using the basic 3d 'Union', 'Subtract' and 'Intersect' functions to generate the profiles of the mitred tubes (and you can 'snap' any section tube to a centreline using the 3Dalign command).

Bob: I actually quite enjoy playing around in 3D in AutoCAD, so provided you've no particularly pressing deadlines, I'd be happy to turn your 2D drawings into a 3D model, if you like.

I assume that you're in the States, since you are discussing prices in US$, otherwise I'd have offered to do your large format printing, too. Most drawing office supply/reprographics companies can print directly from AutoCAD generated .dxf files, though, or I can produce .pdf format files that anyone can read and print, if required.