But Murray there must be something putting people off as they have had the chance to use F360 for a couple of years now but plenty seemed keen to try Alibre from the responce in the previous thread. Maybe it's the cloud thing or the fear that they may invest even more time in F360 and then they change their terms and start charging, possibly just too many bells and whistles when something less daunting may be more first time user friendly, who knows.

Edited By JasonB on 27/10/2018 13:29:04

Edited By Neil Wyatt on 27/10/2018 15:53:09

I'm with Muzzer on this and can't understand the Alibre euphoria. It seems their offer is becoming more common as the CNCCookbook site are also offering Alibre for 6 months free and then 15% discount on the basic package. It looks like an aggressive marketing campaign on the part of the Alibre management to try to win back some market share ?

I am also concerned that there is perhaps some misunderstanding. Are people maybe thinking that by designing in a 3D CAD package they will then be able to press a button and magically get a finished product ? It is what it is, just a drawing package. To get product from it you need either a 3D printer or a CNC device. To get your design into these devices you will then need an intermediate package(s) to slice the 3D model or produce the GCode CAM. These both represent a further learning curve on yet another software package – a package or packages that may also cost you further subscription funding.

Fusion does the CAD, 3D CAM / CNC CAM in the one package and is free. What's not to like ?

There are some further thoughts here.

Edited By Neil Wyatt on 27/10/2018 15:53:19

Well, I guess if Neil had chosen to give F360 a free promotion, there might have been a similar take up. Of course, as F360 is free anyway, the concept of "promotion" has a different complexion. With Atom, it's effectively a delayed payment (or option not to buy if you don't get on with it) but it's still a significant purchase by another name.

I believe Autodesk's repeated promises not to charge for hobby use but if it ever happened I suspect it would be some years in the future, at which point there is likely to be a reasonable choice of good quality / good value CAD and CAM – and many of us will be in the armchair / workshop in the sky. by then. In the meantime I won't be looking the Fusion gift horse in the mouth. It's a pretty darned amazing product and when you get into CAM, there are very few products that come close in terms of features and price – or total lack of price in this case.

I wasn't planning on saving my bank details on the Fusion / A360 cloud and I'm struggling to think any of us would have anything to be worried about keeping our own funny little designs there.

Murray

Edited By Neil Wyatt on 27/10/2018 15:53:30

There are also users like me who use their CAD package for work as well as their Hobby, when I originally bought Alibre PE which was then their equivalent to Atom it was a good price and I was not paying for all the stuff I did not need. Whats the cost of a basic Autodesk commercial product?

I like to go with reasonably priced, one-man-band software, instead of the bloated, overpriced stuff. I usually find it to be easier to use than open source too.

My CAD is by Moment of Inspiration (MoI) and is much, much easier for me get my head around compared to the likes of Fusion 360 or other similar software. Almost everyone that tries it likes it.

For CAM, I use CamBam and ECam. Between the two, I can knock out efficient gcode that needs no alterations for both my mill and lathe.

Anyone contemplating getting into 3d CAD should be aware that if you intend to cut your models on a CNC machine, then you'll more than likely be using 2d profile curves in the CAM system – so be sure you can easily export DXF file from your chosen CAD software.

Martin.

Edited By blowlamp on 27/10/2018 16:26:45

Try it again, recent versions are much more stable.

Pros: Free, not cloud based, no licensing issues or commercial uncertainties. It has a number of other workbenches (like architectural drawing) not supported by Fusion.

Cons: Still in development with major features slow to appear. The Mechanical CAD workbench is limited to single parts – assemblies and joints are not available – and the drawing tools are basic making modelling certain objects awkward.

Bottom line for home workshop: good for modelling single parts but gets clumsy as complexity rises. Easier to use than Fusion but much less capable. Up to a point I prefer it to Fusion, but Fusion does much, much more. Good choice if you have simple requirements and don't trust big business. Not a good choice for advanced users in a hurry.

Dave

Yeah, they bought and stuffed NetFabb too!
NetFabb was a really slick product until Autodesk got their mitts on it.

[This posting has been removed]

Maybe your CAM package is a bit more upmarket than mine, but it's fairly easy to extract edges & intersections from a model to get something similar from MoI and then export them as DXFs.

I must say though, I can't remember when I last needed to do a real 3d milling job, almost everything I get can be handled with profiles and pockets etc.

Martin.

I don't think John drew much in 3D as he got me to draw up stuff from his 2D drawings so he could print the items.

It is interesting the comments about 2D, 2.5D and 3D CAM, if I were to get a CNC then it would be for things that I can't do manually on the mill which is full 3D such as flywheels with nicely shaped spokes and engine cylinders that I want to look like castings that can't easily be fabricated.

I also don't see that you must have a 3D Printer or CNC machine to get an end product from 3D Cad. I use mine to design in and then print off 2D drawings that I can manually machine from or if I want some flat plate cut can e-mail off the file for laser or waterjet cutting or simply send a nice looking rendered perspective to a client who will be able to understand that rather than being presented a set of 2D black and white drawings.