# CAD like programs



## MysticCottage (Aug 18, 2012)

I have been considering purchasing and using a program that can assist me in cost forecasting, designing, and display for customers. I have looked at Sketchlist, but found it to be very time consuming and you must have a different prospect on how to tell the program what you want. It is not just as simple and putting down measurements. The board cut layout is also difficult to operate.

So, question…is there a better program, or do I just need to learn the program better?


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## crank49 (Apr 7, 2010)

I think most folks on here use Sketchup; free software from Google.
I have not used it, but know it is 3D based and would therefore be more useful for making presentations than working drawings.

I have been working with Autocad since 1984 so my opinion might be a little jaded. I can do anything I want to with Autocad, but it is not an easy program to learn without instructions. It's also very expensive, about $3000 per seat.

I have taught several co-workers to use it and it's not that hard with a little hand holding to get you started. It's just not intuitive like some programs.

There is a free 2D CAD program that works exactly like Autocad available from Solid Works called Draftsight, I think. I have it a home and it works great. That's the way I would go, but, like I said, I may be Jaded.


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## BrandonW (Apr 27, 2010)

Like Crank says, Sketchup is the one people here use the most. As someone who used Autocad and Adobe Illustrator, I found Sketchup to be completely counter intuitive. I don't really like the program much. That said, if you haven't used the other programs before, you might not be set in your ways and find it easy to use.

Crank, thanks for the suggestion of Draftsight. I'll have to look into that.


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## Loren (May 30, 2008)

eCabinets is available free from Thermwood. I haven't used
it in awhile… at the time I was using it the software really
pushed the limits of common computers but was very 
capable. These days fast computers aren't uncommon
or costly so eCabinets should be more satisfying.

It has a significant learning curve to build things from 
scratch in it, but you can store and modify designs and
parse costs and materials with a lot of control in it.

For furniture, Sketchup is easier to learn I think.


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## jdmaher (May 4, 2011)

Cost forecasting??? More on that later.

I DID use Autocad, briefly and badlly, with only informal training and and a bit of hand-holding from some regular Autocad users. It was a very painful experience for about two years of my life. Then Skethcup came out. I tried it. I bought it. I've bought every upgrade. I use it every week - but only for an hour or two, so I'm not really "expert".

I believe that my limited bad experience with Autocad actually PREPARED me fo Sketchup, though I do NOT suggest that route to anyone. For me, these drawing programs are just NOT intuitive.

But Sketchup works. It works really well. The FREE version is actually more than I need. There are many good and free tutorials available for learning Sjetchup basics. I believe its worth spending about 8 hours, in about one hour sessions - all during a single week - to get familiar with the basics. If you then use the program regularly (say, at least once a week), you'll be quite competent in about three months.

Competent at sketching designs and making them presentable to show others.

Costing, not so much. There ARE add-on tools for Sketchup to help do that, and many people think they are quite good. I've never found one that was simple, easy to understand and easy to use. Its probably just the very casual way that I do my drawings (which doesn't jibe well with cut-list costing tools). However, I've tried several and was never able to take one of my existing furniture designs and get a costed parts list in a four-hour session. I decided that, for me, it ain't worth the effort.

So, for sketching, I recommend Sketchup. But not for costing.

There may be better choices available if you are running a production shop. For example, I know there a packages tailored for kitchen cabinet makers and semi-custom house builders. For large-scale furntire production, many firms DO use AutoCAD - along with MFA drafting people and CNC machinery.

What kind of work are you doing?


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## casual1carpenter (Aug 16, 2011)

I use a program called ViaCad, it took a while to learn and use but I had bought it and spent the time to try and use its abilities to my advantage. I do believe that it is still a more capable program then I have the knowledge to use. The big advantage for me is being able to go from a thought / concept and drawing the major elements begin to work in the minor elements and critique my final 3D drawing, individual parts, and construction methods.

There are numerous free, inexpensive, as well as costly programs available. Most are available as trial downloads that you can get to see if you might be able to wrap your brain around how to use them. I can say that Sketchup had me dazed and confused but drawing in 3D mode of ViaCad made a bit more sense to my particular warped brain.


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## bruc101 (Sep 13, 2008)

I think one of the reasons people have problems learning a cad program is they don't know and understand drafting and cad terminology. Once you learn those two things then learning a cad program will be much less frustrating.

Learn those two things and then learn how to prompt the cad program to draft for you and you may be surprised at how much easier and faster you can learn the program. Learning cad can be intimidating if you let it but a cad program doesn't understand what you want it to do without telling it what to do. 
"drafting & cad terminology"


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## crank49 (Apr 7, 2010)

bruc101 has a good point.
I have been using Autocad since 1984 and find it very easy and many people compliment my drawings, BUT I was trained in school and worked for 12 years in drafting before I ever saw a CAD program. That makes a huge difference.
I get drawings across my desk every day from "engineers" in various manufacturing plants that look like something a 6th grader drew. In fact, that's about half of my job, to take this crap and make working shop drawings from it.


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## bruc101 (Sep 13, 2008)

You hit it dead on Michael. I took drafting in high school all the way through college becoming an architectural engineer….all on a drafting board and using a slide rule. When Autocad came out it was a piece of cake for me because i knew how to draft and all the terminology that goes with it. All I had to do was learn how to tell Autocad what I wanted it to do.

I taught my daughters how to read drawings and what the drafting terminology meant on the drawings. When they learned that is when I sat them down in front of Autocad and taught them how to tell Autocad what I wanted it to draw.

Two of them have architectural degrees, the 16 year old twins are getting proficient in Autocad and the 13 year old is now learning to tell Autocad what she wants it to draw for her. Another suggestion learning..learn to do what you need to do first in cad, not try to learn the complete program..it ain't going to happen no matter how good you are in cad.

Here is some drafting terminology on my plans site I made for anyone not understanding how to read cad drawings. When you learn the terminology then Autocad will draft for you when you learn the commands and how to dimension. Piece of cake.

http://plans.testsitem3.info/symbols.htm


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## HoosierDude (Feb 22, 2010)

I use the free version of Sketchup to draw out my models and use CutList to generate the cut lists, bill of materials, and cost information. There are two plugin's for Sketchup that work together to create an export file out of Sketchup for CutList.

First Cutlist Bridge. This plugin helps you define your components with information that CutList will use to create your "parts". You define what sub-assemblies a component belongs to, what material it is contrstructed from, etc.

Second CutList for Sketchup=. This plugin can create a .csv file that you can import directly into CutList fx.

The only cost in the above scenario is $89.00 for the silver edition of CutList Plus fx. Combined, they create a very robust and easy to use method for me to design and estimate the cost of projects.

One final word about Sketchup for anyone that finds it difficult to use. I highly recommend Tim Killen's excellent e-book, Sketchup Guide for Woodworkers.

Hope this helps. Good Luck!


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## MrRon (Jul 9, 2009)

At the age of 66, I had an introductory course on Autocad at a community college. That led me to a job as an Acad designer. It took a lot of work and asking questions, so by the time 3 months had passed, I was up to speed. Even at that age, with no previous experience or exposure, I was still able to learn. As the saying goes, "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" is false. An old dog like me can always learn something new and so can you. It takes desire, confidence and lots of work to succeed. If you think you can't do it, you have already failed. Autocad is a difficult program to learn, but many millions have learned it. Now at the ripe old age of 78, I still work at Acad and learn something new each and every day. Just don't expect a CAD program to do all the work for you. It is just a tool and one that requires a learning curve. It doesn't matter which CAD program you use. Just put all your effort into learning and it will pay you back.


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## casual1carpenter (Aug 16, 2011)

bruc101, I checked out that symbols link and peeked at you pages there. Nicely done.

Earlier on the LJ front page was a recipe box project, http://lumberjocks.com/projects/4081
I used his picture and did a quick draw. By the way his looks a lot nicer. It was not a complicated project in that it consists of four sides, a top, bottom and divider. By drawing in 3D mode I can use simple primitives to rough out dimensions etc and see the idea in 3D from various angles. I still have the ability to pull and or note dimensions etc, switch line styles and views, and model to sheet in 2d/3d


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## LepelstatCrafts (Jan 16, 2011)

I use Solidworks. It currently is the engineering standard program for CAD. It will even allow you to calculate the weight of the product, render what the image looks like, comes with a hardware tool box so you can add fasteners, allows you to import products from manufactures such as McMaster-Carr, etc. There are a lot of things you can do with Solidworks since it is so intuitive.


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## casual1carpenter (Aug 16, 2011)

Mike, just what is a Solidworks seat worth? I make my living being retired and before I was in the construction / metal trades. I sort of assign value to things and what is good value to business is not always good value to a home user like me. This program I used is number 2 of 5 with 5 being the best but highest priced of that bunch. I have used the entire punch cad series as I get access to the beta testing trials.


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## bruc101 (Sep 13, 2008)

Thanks for your compliment casual1carpenter. I have a lot of fun with that site and meet a lot of interesting woodworkers. I hope to be able to have the time soon to finish up some more of the plans. I've got about 50 more I want to add to it. Your cad work and your box looks great.

Mike, Solid Works is a great cad program. Glad to hear you're impressed with it.


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## sawdustrich (Dec 1, 2007)

crank49,
I am in the same boat. Autocad user since the late 80's and it is amazing how bad some
of the autocad dwgs are I have seen from other cad users. Lines that don't touch in corners,
parts of the dwg that was just eyeballed in instead of drawn to scale, different size text and 
horrible layering systems. I feel your pain.
Keep at it.


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## grfrazee (Jul 17, 2012)

I learned AutoCAD in high school (about a decade ago) and have been using it on and off ever since. I'm a structural engineer by trade, but we have drafters at my company that do all of the drafting. Usually I hand-sketch what I want them to draw up, but occasionally I use CAD if I really need to get the proportions/scale right.

@sawdustrich, I completely sympathize. I am by no means a CAD standards expert, but sometimes reviewing drawings that others (draftsmen, nonetheless!) have done, I feel like they need to go back to school.

I used to use AutoCAD for a lot of woodworking projects until I discovered SketchUp. There was a bit of a learning curve coming from AutoCAD, but once I got the hang of SketchUp, I loved it. I've never done 3D modeling in AutoCAD since most buildings are drawn in 2D, so I can't speak to AutoCAD's versatility in that. However, I've saved myself quite a few times by doing a 3D model in SketchUp and finding places where I would have messed up measurements or similar, and that was just by taking the time to make everything fit in the 3D model.


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## BritBoxmaker (Feb 1, 2010)

I use and recommend TurboCAD (I'm still using Version 15 Pro though I believe they are up to 19 by now). Very similar in approach and power to AutoCAD but a lot cheaper. Good 3D tools and rendering. Very easy to take dimensions off of a 3D model of your design or produce 2D elevations from it.


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## Mosquito (Feb 15, 2012)

When I was in high school, I took Drafting and Design, which was almost all drafting on paper, with a week of AutoCAD, and then I took Architecture I & II, and we primarily used AutoCAD for a lot of those two classes. I ended up going the computer science route in college, but I started using SketchUp when I started woodworking a little over a year ago.

I had access to AutoCAD still, but I found that SketchUp was, although different, a lot more simple to use, and I could throw simple things together quickly. I think I was in a good spot, though. I had learned AutoCAD in school, but then forgotten most of the things specific to AutoCAD, yet retained the concepts of working with a drafting program…


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## bruc101 (Sep 13, 2008)

Sometimes we get cabinetry designs done in Autocad sent to us from architects. What a mess most of them are and one of us has to spend hours trying to figure out their messes.We have to take the plans apart and make shop drawings from them.

I had a homeowner hand me a set yesterday from an architect's firm, The architect and I went to college together and he hired a cad intern last summer. When I saw the drawings I laughed and took them to one of my oldest daughters office and left them on her work station.

When she found them this morning she called our friend the architect and I heard her ask him..who the h*** drew these bonehead plans? You getting so OLD you not able to see your monitor anymore! Our kids very seldom are out spoken like that and they've been taught not to talk like that.

All of us in the office started laughing and we knew who had drawn the plans…the intern. She really got on him about the plans and I'm sure he was laughing at her also. not good…sure was funny though.

I called him after his tongue lashing from my daughter and we both had a good laugh about it. I asked him where he got this intern and he said from a tech school where he was taking a 12 month Autocad course.

He told me the kid's internship will end next week and he sure was glad of it. He told me the kid is a nice kid and really wants to be a cad operator but it seems the cad program at the school is get their money and never teach them the fundamentals of cad.

After looking over the plans I would have to agree with him. He called my daughter back and told her he would redraw the plans and bring them to her tomorrow. I heard her say..good boy! lol


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## wormil (Nov 19, 2011)

I was trained in drafting then in Autocad but unfortunately that does me no good since I don't have $3k to spend on a copy (and probably have forgotten how to use it). Someone recently recommended this site and sketchup although I've yet to try either:
http://sketchupforwoodworkers.com/


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## Woodmaster1 (Apr 26, 2011)

I will have autodesk products to use for three more years. When I retire from teaching autodesk products will no longer be available to me. I still like making quick sketches by hand. I think that is because drafting without computers was how I learned to do things.


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## MysticCottage (Aug 18, 2012)

Thank you all for your opinions and suggestions. I have decided to try the sketch up and take the tutorial that goes along with it. I hope you all have a good weekend and a blessed Thanksgiving.


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

I use Creo Elements/Direct Modeling from PTC which is also free. "My blog": http://lumberjocks.com/oldnovice/blog/32529 shows some of the things that this program can do.

The link below is to the free download site for Creo Elements/Direct Modeling

I have used this program *the free version* since about 2002 and find it full featured enough for all of my task including woodworking! I was trained on the full version when I was still working and was very happy when the free version was released.

My CAD training goes back to the days of the GE Calma station which was basically an electronic version drafting board, no 3D models or graphics. These stations were monsters!


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## bruc101 (Sep 13, 2008)

There are 2 Autocad 2000 training books that walk you through using AC 2000 with explanations and the exercises you do yourself using the books. I'm sure the exercises will work on later versions as well.

The books are well worth the money they cost which isn't much.

EXERCISE WORKBOOK FOR BEGINNING AUTOCAD 2000
EXERCISE WORKBOOK FOR ADVANCED AUTOCAD 2000
by Cheryl R.Shrock

We still use AC 2000 because we think it's the best version and we use it on Windows 2000 Pro NT
Our last upgrade was 2004 and the only reason we did the upgrade was to make one of our regular clients happy. What he didn't know is all the drafting work we did for him was still being done in 2000 until we told him, and we're still doing his drafting for him in 2000 and he could care less now.

Autocad 2000 is a hot item on Ebay but still can still be bought for a cheap price. It will run on XP in compatibility mode.

Thanks for the link old novice. I took a look at it and it seems to be a robust cad program. I'm sure it comes, as all cad programs do, with a learning curve. I'm going to download and take a look at it.


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

I like 2D drawings as my plans 3D models are good for visualization and creating the actual parts but when it comes to cutting a piece of wood or whatever, I like to have a 2D drawing with the dimensions.

*Creo provides 2D drawings that I don't have to create as it does it from the 3D parts I have designed.*

And, I can have Creo add the dimensions or I can select the dimensions I want/need!


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## DLCW (Feb 18, 2011)

I use Sketchup (free version), cutlistbridge plugin (from Chiefwoodworker) and Cutlist Plus Fx from Bridgewood Design. I can start with a blank slate in Sketchup, create furniture or other project, use cutlistbridge to export to Cutlist Plus Fx, import into Cutlist Plus Fx, and start putting an estimate together. It works VERY well.

For cabinet work, I use eCabinets from Thermwood and export the designs to my CNC for cutting. eCabinets does have a learning curve but they provide some really good videos and tutorials to get you going. I've put together estimating spreadsheets to take the data from eCabinets and create detailed estimates.

Both programs provide for some really good capabilities to show customers what you are doing for them. Have them come sit in front of your computer with you and show them the project from many directions along with how it is put together (show off your craftsmanship and attention to details).


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## addvalue (Jun 26, 2013)

Hello all. Can someone please contact Dan'um Style for me? I just joined lumberjocks tonight and have to post 5 replies to be eligible to contact him. This is reply #1 to a forum topic. In particular I'm looking for a copy of AutoCad release 14. I just purchased a CalComp Model 1023 pen plotter and finding it nearly impossible to find the software to run it. If anyone can help me, I would really appreciate it!

Also, does anyone know of an alternate software that would work?

Ron / 48(zero) - 695 - 447(zero)
[email protected] . com


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