I left Ohio 20 years ago because the auto industry work dried up, so I moved to Detroit because there were many job openings with better pay. Best decision ever.
A CAD cert along with an industrial engineering degree would be very desirable up here. Job market is booming.
I have to disagree. If you had said CAM I would agree, as most of the CAM stuff in the free Fusion 360 is disabled. But if you want to learn parametric modeling, or design and print parts on an FDM 3D printer, the free Fusion 360 has pretty much all the features you need.
Fusion 360 has been crippled for hobby use now in a number of ways. The most annoying for me is a limit on how many active models you can have at any given time. Many of the high end features aimed at things like controlling mills and stress analysis are disabled. But all the basic modelling features are there. I designed a lamp and printed it on my 3D printer, and it worked great.
The limited version does not inhibit learning CAD in any way I can think of, save that you can only have a certain number of active files, so if you have a complex design with many parts it’s a hassle. But maybe I’m forgetting/missing something.
IDKittyKat: As others have said, to get into actual technical/engineering drafting, you need to have a lot of domain knowledge, and ideally a degree or at least a 2-year diploma/associate degree in the engineering field you want to work in. But there are lots of other places where such work can be had - for example, there is a large market for 3D models for games, VR, advertising, corporate publications, etc. Lots of those jobs allow remote work, too.
If you are interested in that kind of work, the good news is that Blender is free for educational or hobby use, and it’s one of the standards for 3D modeling. Jobs like this generally don’t require a degree, but they do generally require a portfolio of your work, and you’ll need to either have or develop an artistic eye.
You don’t need artistic mechanical skill - the software will do that for you. But you still need to be creative and have a good artistic eye. Whereas in engineering CAD you are often given very strict requirements and there may be no room for expression at all - which is good if you have no artistic talent.
There is also a market for the models themselves. You can create 3D models and sell them through online marketplaces just like freelance photogrpaphers sometimes submit photos to stock photo sites and get a portion of the money from the sales. I suspect this won’t earn you more than beer money, though.
Although it’s mildly annoying, that’s all it is, unless you are building many-component assemblies. I just set my models to “read-only” when I’m done with them and easily stay under the limit.
As for CAM, one of the annoying things is that it won’t use G0 (rapid) moves when retracted, only G1. That can halve machining time, or worse. I wrote a postprocessor in Perl that fixes up most of these.
My mill has an automatic tool changer, but I haven’t used it much because F360 limits that as well. However, I plan on writing a postprocessor for that.
I don’t have a 4th axis for my machine yet, but it’s a possibility at some point. That will require a license upgrade for full functionality, though in many cases I just want to rotate by a fixed amount (90 degrees, etc.) to perform an operation on another side. Again, some basic postprocessing solves that one.
I worked with CAD men for 25 years.
Yes, CAD is used in map making & supporting Photogrammetry.
I’ve been in the oil and gas industry in Texas for over 40 years and started on the board with just a drafting certificate. As drafting became computerized, I had to learn lots of different software. I’m now a senior designer and currently use Creo (Pro/E) and Autocad. I love the work!
Another type of work you might apply for is making 3D models for places like Swagelok and Crosby, where designers like me can download free Cad models.
I have loved my career and made (make!) good money for the little education I had. Now I would recommend, as others have said, getting at least an associates degree to get your foot in the door. Good luck!
Also - there is a definite lack of ANSYS techs in our neck of the woods. That software does FEA analysis of mechanical parts and assemblies. Might be something to consider.
I haven’t read the whole thread, but I just wanted to point out that I employ several freelance CAD designers in Eastern Europe on websites like Upworks, and they are plentiful and work really cheap. I don’t think someone living in North America or Western Europe could support themselves on what those freelancers charge.
You really shouldn’t be considering doing finite element analysis (FEA) without at least a mechanical engineering or engineering mechanics background and several years of experience under the mentorship of an experienced analyst. I know that engineering software companies try to push “easy-to-use” interfaces and versions of finite element solvers and pre-/post-processors, and if you have the aptitude for doing CAD modeling work you can probably use to learn the code, but there is far more to doing FEA properly and getting reliable or even useful results beyond driving the software. I’ve seen so much shitty analysis with bad assumptions, poor constraints and boundary conditions, and incompetent results interpretation leading to defective products or systems that I think there should actually be a professional licensing process for doing FEA (and structural analysis in general).
Stranger
Good point, there. In my defense, I am not an engineer!
That’s what I was going to say… there’ll always be jobs in the civil engineering industry, either working directly for some branch of government, or working for the engineering firms hired by them to build roads, dams, bridges, and all sorts of infrastructure like that.
My husband started out as a pen-and-ink drafter. He was going to community college to get a two year degree in drafting and design, but a big local engineering firm (C. F. Braun) came around to talk to the students. The students were invited to stop studying, come directly to the firm and the firm would complete their training. My husband took them up and got excellent training which he was eventually able to use to get even better jobs as the years went on. But how was he to know that in the future a degree would be required for a lot of CAD jobs?
He took to CAD quickly and easily and has always gotten great reviews everywhere he worked. But the lack of the degree sometimes held him back. Luckily, he’s now working at a huge and famous corporation and is master and keeper of all their CAD drawings and space plans. At age 70! And without a degree!
In the construction industry, there is AutoCAD and Revit (3D) work in architecture, HVAC and civil fields. Lots of use of ArchiCAD in architecture too.
At least in Australia there is lots and lots of work right now (although I assume you’re in the US).
NB