Thanks! I have been using Sketchup for years and the shine, especially with the free but awful Sketchup web, has worn right off.
I know I have perused Fusion 360 in the past but haven’t dug into it. I will have to make that a winter project.
There’s definitely a learning curve, but it’s not too bad IMO. Get comfortable with 2D sketches and work from there. Plenty of stuff can be made with just a single sketch of the base, and then extruding upward in various lengths. Or sketching a cross-section and then revolving around an axis. It can be tricky to wrap your head around but it becomes fairly natural after a while.
Make sure to dimension everything. Fusion 360 (and similar CAD apps) work by solving a constraint problem. This makes it very easy to change dimensions after the fact without having to redesign everything. Makes for very rapid iteration when combined with a 3D printer, laser cutter, etc.
If you have trouble getting your blade to run straight I will give you a very important tip. Not all the videos suggest this but put countless hours on a bandsaw and can attest to it. Adjust your blade so the deepest part of the gullet is running down the center of your wheel.
I personally don’t do character miniatures but LOVE the use of household stuff to make the “terrain” for want of a better word. Right now I’m doing a two-walled bookshelf insert of a piece of my dream Old World Traveller sitting room. I see that doing this kind of stuff has gotten popular enough that you can buy patterns but I still love making this stuff out of Amazon boxes and make up puffs.
Cardboard, cosmetic pad and paper bag wing chair in progress.
I love it, although it took a while to get the hang of the parametric modeling. But they have been restricting it to the point where a larger hobby project is hard to manage, and the paid version is a lot of bucks.
SolidWorks is free, on the condition that all your files have to be saved to a public cloud where anyone can see and use them. Fine for truly ooen-source stuff, but when you are playing around with something you *might turn into a product, that’s not great.
The difference between simple modeling and parametric modeling is all about being able to easily change and revise a design. If everything is dimensioned properly, you can change a sketch and have your changes automatically adjust everything else. It takes longer to set up the initial design, perhaps, but after that maintenance and updating is much, much easier.
The RGB LEDs I’m using draw about 50mA at full brightness white. There are 60 of them on that light tree, so a maximum draw of about 3A. I could limit the brightness or even design the patterns so only a percentage are on at a given time, but it seemed easier to just power them.
These are the LEDs I use:
Each ‘light’ on the strip is actually three LEDs and a tiny microprocessor. They are each individually addressible.
I’m using one of these guys for powering the LEDs:
And the control input for the LEDs wants 5V, and the ESP32 on its own won’t do that, so I use a level converter. I’ve tried feeding 3.3V to the signal line, but the LEDs become flaky.
I watch Clough42 on YouTube and I have seen how flexible it can be designing in Fusion 360.
Yeah. I relied heavily on Youtube videos in evaluating the CAD packages and then learning how to use Fusion 360 properly. I love how you can self-learn almost anything technical this way.
There’s a lot wrong with the web and internet, but there’s a lot of good too.
Oh dang, I didn’t realize they put out a new license. I might give that a try. I cut my parametric teeth on SolidWorks, but went to Fusion 360 due to the free license.
So far, I don’t really have a problem with putting all my old projects in read-only mode. And haven’t had anything complicated enough that the limited working set is a problem. But it might be a problem someday.
Yeah. It’s amazing to say “oh, I want to change the wall thickness of this part from 1.5 mm to 1.8” and then just have it happen instantly without touching anything else.
I think it encourages a better design philosophy, too. It’s a higher level of abstraction, like with higher-level programming techniques. Just ensuring that your design is fully constrained is a huge advantage and forces you to really think about how your design fits together.
I have a box of that exact type. Yeah, quite handy when you need a bit more juice. Good efficiency and works across a wide range of voltages.
Not my work, but I think the people in this thread will really appreciate this video:
Very nice! How big is that? What is left to do on it?
It’s 2 1/2 inch tall and it doesn’t have it’s cushions. That’s the bottom one waiting for its ‘leather’. And also coloring.
Very nice. You should post a pic when it’s done.
Suspension & brakes on a Saturn:
Still needs coloring. Not sure I’m putting these in my booknook. They are too asymmetrical, need better button-y thingies on the Chesterfield and I want to try a different technique for paper bag look like leather.
On our recent trip to Europe, I took a beginner’s class in glassblowing on the Venetian island of Murano, famous for its glass. I made two little vases: the first (on the left) was mostly the work of my instructor, to acquaint me with the processes and techniques. The other, more irregular one, was mostly my work.
(Me on the left.)
The ambient temps outside in July were in the high 90s, and it was even hotter in the hot shop, but I had a great time and enjoyed every minute of it.
That’s freakin’ fantastic!
I have to apologize. I got Solidworks mixed up with OnShape. It’s OnShape that has the restriction that free use must be public domain.
Solidworks has a ‘Maker’ version: $9.99/mo for noncommercial use. For startups they have an interesting model where the first year is free, the second year is 70% off, 3rd year 50% off, then you pay the full amount after that.