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CAD drawing programs?

Tom Albrecht

Tom Albrecht

Joined
Feb 8, 2014
Messages
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Location
Evanston, IL USA
Can anybody here recommend an easy to use drawing program that can produce templates, or measured drawings of projects?

I am looking for something to produce drawings that my advanced students could use for laying out and following while taking a project from start to finish.
 
Seems to me that segmenter's pro software (I forget its name, over at seg wood turner club's website) might do that easily enough, it can at least design the profile you are after, even if the actual wood isn't segmented? At least from the previews I have seen of the software. I actually am saving up to get a copy of that myself.
 
I would recommend Woodturner Pro (https://woodturnerpro.com/). They actually have two products (Woodturner Pro and Segment Pro) ... both are very good programs, powerful yet easy to learn, and their customer support is top drawer.
 
GRJensen said:
I would recommend Woodturner Pro (https://woodturnerpro.com/). They actually have two products (Woodturner Pro and Segment Pro) ... both are very good programs, powerful yet easy to learn, and their customer support is top drawer.
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It's unclear from the original query just what sort of projects are intended. The focus of these programs is segmented work. They may allow generating shapes, but you'd be paying for a program in which you'd use only a small fraction I also have been looking for an elementary CAD program simply to draw shapes only -- haven't found one. The CAD programs I've found are complex, with a steep learning curve, and I am 'software-challenged'.
 
Thank you. Segmenting is way beyond where I want to go. I just want to layout simple dimensioned plans for turned projects. My drawing and drafting skills aren't are pretty limited, but that may be what I have to work on.
 
I have been a free Sketchup user for years. I started looking for a replacement as the company has been moving to online paid subscriptions, but have not found one that I want to invest the time.

Tom, it sounds like you want to be able to share drawings with your students. A consideration may be an Open Source solution, which there are several, so students can take your drawings and duplicate them to learn the software.
 
Doug Agee said:
I have been a free Sketchup user for years. I started looking for a replacement as the company has been moving to online paid subscriptions, but have not found one that I want to invest the time.
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I have tried using SketchUp several times but never came close to success. Maybe something on the page linked above might be simple enough???
I've done a lots of drawing by hand professionally -- approximately 10,000 measured drawings of pottery in my archaeological career, and even more sketches. In designing spindle projects -- what I do most of the time recently -- I use a pencil and graph paper printed from an online 'design your own' graph paper. It provides an adequate guide for me to work from. Not pretty but as much as I need.
 
Tom Albrecht said:
Thanks R

What scale draft paper are you using, and do you have an on-line link?
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I use incompetech.com for printing, simply because it's the first one I found years ago. There are others. You can set the scale to whatever interval you want, set line thickness, etc. Many different grids -- I use a square and triangular/hexagonal mostly at a wide variety of scales. Make the graph paper appropriate to the task.
 
Tom Albrecht said:
Can anybody here recommend an easy to use drawing program
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OK Tom, that's just a unicorn :). They're all hard to learn and hard to use.

I have experience with Sketchup (I use 2016 version) and Fusion 360 (current free version). Both have steep learning curves. The advantage of Sketchup is that there are more tutorials (I particularly recommend the e-book by Bob Lang, even though it is several years old). I found few tutorials for Fusion 360 that were relevant to what I was trying to do, but have managed to get to a point where I am able to do what I need to do.

Which brings up another issue. What are your projects? Flatwork or turned work? For flatwork, Sketchup is hands down the better program. Unfortunately Sketchup cannot draw a true circle, only a polygon with a high number of sides. This is OK, if all you are trying to draw is a simple turned object like a drawer knob, or maybe a table leg. Sketchup does not do well for rendering more complex turnings. Fusion on the other hand does draw true circles and it's easier to add and subtract two 3D models. And I find it difficult to get Fusion to report the object's dimensions. This probably reflects my level of understanding.

Lastly I will mention a program I've heard about, but have not used. Free CAD. I've heard it's a good program but I have no personal experience. It's probably no easier to learn than Fusion 360, but it's open source--I keep waiting for Fusion to lock up all my drawings and demand a $buscription :eek:.
 
Try Shapr3d. While I personally like Sketchup, I’m trying Shapr3d for comparison. Very similar in my opinion.
 
I've not yet found a program that is worth the learning curve investment, at least since MacDraw back in the 80's, which was perfect and intuitive for furniture design. I find programs like Illustrator and Photoshop to be trivial in comparison to the many CAD programs I've tried. I put a solid month in on Sketchup with a 3 day class, private tutorials, and lots of practice. It was a disaster, there was still always some well hidden unfinished object or surface that screwed things up-- the program seemed buggy as heck. I gave up.
When I need to, I use either Fusion 360 (the free version) to make drawings for 3D printing, or EasyDraw for 2D drawings. If I just need a picture rather than a "measured drawring" I use Illustrator, or even Powerpoint.
I don't find 3D drawings to be particularly useful for design purposes, I actually can better envision the object by looking at 2D front, site, and top elevations than at a 3D perspective picture. As my wife frequently reminds me, I'm weird. When I'm designing nothing so far beats paper and pencil-- it's only gotten worse as I've started making furniture with more curves and fewer straight lines.
 
Roger Wiegand said:
I've not yet found a program that is worth the learning curve investment, at least since MacDraw back in the 80's, which was perfect and intuitive for furniture design. I find programs like Illustrator and Photoshop to be trivial in comparison to the many CAD programs I've tried. I put a solid month in on Sketchup with a 3 day class, private tutorials, and lots of practice. It was a disaster, there was still always some well hidden unfinished object or surface that screwed things up-- the program seemed buggy as heck. I gave up.
When I need to, I use either Fusion 360 (the free version) to make drawings for 3D printing, or EasyDraw for 2D drawings. If I just need a picture rather than a "measured drawring" I use Illustrator, or even Powerpoint.
I don't find 3D drawings to be particularly useful for design purposes, I actually can better envision the object by looking at 2D front, site, and top elevations than at a 3D perspective picture. As my wife frequently reminds me, I'm weird. When I'm designing nothing so far beats paper and pencil-- it's only gotten worse as I've started making furniture with more curves and fewer straight lines.
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Shapr3d takes a different approach and you won’t find yourself chasing the missing polygon issues. But, you have to give up cultist. If you have an iPad, Shapr3d is a pretty good choice.
 
I can't imagine a CAD program worth its salt not having a steep learning curve. I faced this when I got a 3d printer last November and wanted to do more than print other peoples designs.

I settled on OnShape (free). It's cloud based with the only limitation of the free version is that your designs are stored as public files. I'm not doing anything proprietary so it isn't a concern.
The learning curve has been manageable. Though I still have a long ways to go I've designed and printed quite a few useful items both for the home and shop.
 
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