# Sketchup Alternative?



## Sanderguy777 (Feb 9, 2015)

Been using Sketchup Make for years and I loved it. However, I just got a new computer that doesn't have it and I looked at getting it again. The newest fad seems to be for digital design companies to make everything cloud-based and Trimble did an outstanding job. By outstanding I mean the way a hammered thumb is outstanding!

I was wondering if there is a better program that is cheap (under $150 a year or forever is better) that just works. Or if I need to spend the $$$$ for real Autocad?

The problems I have with it are: 
1. Internet-based (response times are full seconds or more)

2. also internet-based (I can't open it offline, or even on my phone [just wanted to see a picture and a few measurements, no editing…])

3. Limited tools (solid sides are normally fine, but being able to see dotted lines of interior components would help)

I know this is a rant, but I remember when it just worked and I didn't need a perfect internet connection or anything. Thanks for the advice.


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## RichT (Oct 14, 2016)

You can still download the regular version of SketchUp that runs locally on your computer.

Edit: Maybe not. The Pro trial used to expire and you were left with the free version. I just noticed my Pro trial expired and there is no option other than to buy Pro.

I still had a 2017 download and that works fine now. Check around and you can probably find a download for 2017 Make.


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## lew (Feb 13, 2008)

Sketchup Make 2017 is still free and computer based-

https://www.sketchup.com/download/all


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## Andybb (Sep 30, 2016)

Somebody beat me to it but… https://www.sketchup.com/download/make


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## John Smith_inFL (Dec 15, 2017)

this is my alternative










.


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## Jimintomahawak (Feb 5, 2017)

Look up draft sight free and you can save pdf to view on your phone. I designed my home with it. It isn't the friendliest interface but it's free @nd works good.


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## Jimintomahawak (Feb 5, 2017)

https://www.draftsight2018.com


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## lew (Feb 13, 2008)

> this is my alternative
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Sketchup runs circles around the old school method. Too bad we lost Dave R as a member. He is the Sketchup Master.


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## Jimintomahawak (Feb 5, 2017)

John's system works good too. I use auto and draftsight and solid works at money making job. Solid works works good but you need to model pieces then assemble them to get individual piece dimensions easily. 8020 and sketchup are great for cabinetry and home design.


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## Sanderguy777 (Feb 9, 2015)

I will look into these, thank you. I actually took a drafting class and loved it up to relearning how to write my alphabet….. I've never seen an architect who listened to that part!

Thanks for the suggestions.


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## RichT (Oct 14, 2016)

> I will look into these, thank you. I actually took a drafting class and loved it up to relearning how to write my alphabet….. I ve never seen an architect who listened to that part!
> 
> Thanks for the suggestions.
> 
> - Sanderguy777


TOM Q VAXY - Letters that should be as wide as they are tall. That mnemonic goes back to 1970, so I guess it worked since I remembered it.

Here's one from my electrical engineering days - Bad Boys R*pe Our Young Girls But Violet Gives Willingly. That's to remember the resistor color codes. Boy how times have changed. That'd get you expelled these days, but my professor wrote it on the chalkboard.


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## Mike_D_S (May 3, 2012)

If you are willing to learn a new platform, then you can get Fusion360 as a hobby guy for free. They have licenses for hobby use.

There's some definite difference between the CAD style and the Sketchup graphics stylings, but overall its not too bad.

Mike


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## woodbutcherbynight (Oct 21, 2011)

> this is my alternative
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Here's mine. I have no formal training, just work with what I have.










End result was not to bad though.


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## John Smith_inFL (Dec 15, 2017)

Rich - one of my first jobs as a kid was working at the local TV & Radio repair store
and my job was sorting resistors with the "formula code" that you described.
from time to time, that phrase still pops into my mind.
a bit of nostalgia there.

.

.


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## RichT (Oct 14, 2016)

> Rich - one of my first jobs as a kid was working at the local TV & Radio repair store
> and my job was sorting resistors with the "formula code" that you described.
> from time to time, that phrase still pops into my mind.
> a bit of nostalgia there.
> ...


The idea of a TV repair shop is nostalgic in itself. They used to be everywhere. I remember when they had tube testers at places like 7/11. Dad and I would mark the tubes and sockets with masking tape so we knew which went where, go test them and hope they had a replacement for the bad one down in the cabinet below the tester.


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## BFamous (Jan 26, 2018)

Not certain what year my version of Sketchup is, but I just updated it last year so I'm assuming 2017. It was free, and installed locally. I'm a huge fan of its functionality and capabilities. There are some oddities, but once you're used to them it is fine…


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## xeddog (Mar 2, 2010)

> If you are willing to learn a new platform, then you can get Fusion360 as a hobby guy for free. They have licenses for hobby use.
> 
> There s some definite difference between the CAD style and the Sketchup graphics stylings, but overall its not too bad.
> 
> ...


I use Fusion360 for my 3d printer designs. It is cloud based, but only for storage of designs. All functionality is local. I think there is a way you can use if offline though, but it starts online. you would have to make archive copies of your models and store them on your computer. I have not tried that but read about it.


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## xeddog (Mar 2, 2010)

Are you a US or Canadian military veteran? If so, you can get Solidworks for $20/yr.

Wayne


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## adr906 (Feb 13, 2018)

I use Draftsight and Fusion360, both are free for hobby use. Fusion works good for me, but I'm to Autodesk products as i use Inventer and AuotCAD at work. I could never really get into Sketchup.


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## wormil (Nov 19, 2011)

Fusion 360 is the new hotness but it's cloud based.


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## lew (Feb 13, 2008)

> Here s one from my electrical engineering days -
> 
> - Rich


Taught that to every Electronics Technology class I had but added "Get, Some, Now" for the tolerance bands. Funny I only had to say it once and they remembered it forever. I guess it's true- "sex sells"


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

*Fusion 360* from Autodesk is *FREE* if you are a student or hobbyist!

It is much better than Sketchup and, for that matter, many other CAD programs available as it has features that other don't, i.e. CAM integration with many post processors, photorealistic rendering, free-form modeling, and more.

There are almost a thousands of *YouTube* videos for learning how to use *Fusion 360* and go into great depth with really intricate designs that can help in nearly all facets of 3D modeling.

The getting started videos by Lars Christensen , and some others too, are very good.

One of the advanced videos shows free-form modeling where a paper sketch is imported, scaled, and then modeled into a 3D object which is, to me at least, somewhat mesmerizing!

I have used Creo, the free version, since 2002 and am switching over to *Fusion 360* as it appears that Creo is static and will not be adding anything new to the version that has been around since 2002!


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

*Ricky M*, what is wrong with cloud based?
So your files are not in your computer, which is nice because my son has access to his work at my house, isn't that "a good thing" (sorry Martha Stewart)!
This site is located in a server someplace too, doesn't that make it cloud based too?


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## MrRon (Jul 9, 2009)

> this is my alternative
> 
> 
> 
> ...


You bring back memories of how I started in the design field 63 years ago. Back then, I started by "tracing" drawings in ink on cloth of battleships for the U.S. Navy. There were many stories about those days of working with ink; one of which I will relate. I would take a piece of cloth, cover it with ink and let it dry. Then I would cut out a shape that looked like an ink spill; place it on a drawing on a neighbors table and wait for the reaction when he returned from the head. To have an actual ink spill on a drawing was bad enough, but the horror on his face would be priceless for all to witness. Even the supervisors would chuckle, but keep a serious stance. I graduated from ink and went on to paper and pencil until I picked up on Autocad in 2002. Now retired from the marine design field, I still do all my home design projects on Autocad. I tried to learn Sketchup, but didn't find it as user friendly as Autocad. I don't do much 3D, and I will try to learn Sketchup for 3D use. CAD programs are like foreign languages; they require their own set of rules. Actually CAD is not hard to learn as long as you are working with it every day like at work where others are there to help you; so much easier than trying to learn it at home on your own.

Times have changed. I would wear a suit, shirt and tie to work back in those early days. Today it's blue jeans and a pull over.


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## therealSteveN (Oct 29, 2016)

> this is my alternative
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Absolutely.

I never did understand how putting Ketchup on a piece of paper made any sense? Pencil and paper, favored by old guys everywhere.


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## ArtMann (Mar 1, 2016)

Fake photo. No self respecting draftsman would use a dull pencil like that.


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

I spent many hours on draft boards from high school on, I even had one at home,
I still have much of my equipment, triangles, scales, many pencils, pencil sharpeners, electric erasers, and assortment of leads.
The biggest problem with the old method is the space it consumes and is why PC CAD is better.

My first CAD was on a GE system, a small command monitor, a larger color 2D drafting monitor, and keyboards all kept in a deathly quite room where there was just enough for this behemoth.
Essentially this was not a 3D CAD system and just an electronic 2D drafting system because 3D was still years away.
GE sold it system to Apollo/Mentor and my company switched to HP Pro Engineer soon after.


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## BobLang (Feb 2, 2009)

SketchUp has made some changes, but all is not lost. While the downloadable SketchUp Make is no longer updated with SketchUp Pro, SketchUp Make 2017 is still available and it will be for the forseeable future. The web-based "SketchUp Free" is a work in progress and is improving. There is also one more version that was recently released "SketchUp Shop". Shop is the web-based version with several of the Pro features included at a pretty reasonable price.

This post on my blog explains the different versions and contains links to get the one that works best for you.

I write a lot about SketchUp and am listed as an Expert SketchUp Trainer, but I have no business or financial connections to the company.


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## MrRon (Jul 9, 2009)

> Fake photo. No self respecting draftsman would use a dull pencil like that.
> 
> - ArtMann


I suspect the photo is of an engineer checking a drawing and not actually doing any drafting work. I am not familiar with a metric triangle and rule made of wood used by any draftsmen. They are always plastic. When I was manual drafting, we used tee squares and triangles, except the tee square would slide along the bottom of the board or table from left to right and triangles slid on the tee square vertically. Those were very large drawings we made for the navy. They were usually 30" wide x 12' long. Today's drawings conform to ANSI standards.


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## RichT (Oct 14, 2016)

> Fake photo. No self respecting draftsman would use a dull pencil like that.
> 
> - ArtMann
> 
> ...


Art was right. It's a stock photo. You can see the watermark in the middle, "Deposit Photos." They are one of many stock photo sites out there. Like Getty, Shutterstock, etc, they are staged photos intended to present a theme or idea. Virtually every photo you see these days, outside of journalistic photos, are stock photos. All of the brochures with feel-good photos of extremely diverse groups of people all smiling and happy use stock photos. Sometimes they are dressed as medical personnel, sometimes first responders, the list goes on and on. There are millions of stock photos out there and some photographers have become quite wealthy from them since big corporations pay big bucks to license them.

Go to stockphoto.com or shutterstock.com for an idea of what's out there. Or just search the web for "stock photos."


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## wormil (Nov 19, 2011)

> *Ricky M*, what is wrong with cloud based?
> - oldnovice


Nothing but I think the op wants an offline solution.


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## John Smith_inFL (Dec 15, 2017)

yes - that is a stock photo I pulled off the net just for an example of how we did it "by hand" 
back in the day…... if I had a need for it, and my attention span was much broader,
I would probably try the new fangled net based design and drafting programs available today.
I just have too many synapse that have been ruined with lead and other chemicals over the years.
a lot to be said for the proper respirators and the discontinuance of harmful stuff in paints and finishes.
the younger generation should take note and pay attention to the more seasoned generation 
when it comes to the safety issues so they can continue to enjoy all that the 21st Century has to offer.

.

.


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## wormil (Nov 19, 2011)

Here you go John


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## John Smith_inFL (Dec 15, 2017)

yep !! that is what I used prior to the Windows-DOS system. (and Tandy TRS-80).
I had a plain school surplus board very similar to that one and a box full
of the plastic curls for sign design. I think I paid around $5k for a sign CAD
program in the late '80s that you can buy today for less than $500.00.
I can only imagine what will be available 10 years from now.
drawing and designing is fun for me. but, I just see so many newbees designing
things that look really great on paper but they can't build it.
(Lockheed-Martin Aerospace comes to mind).

*Thanks Rick !*

.

.


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

> I think I paid around $5k for a sign CAD
> program in the late 80s that you can buy today for less than $500.00.
> I can only imagine what will be available 10 years from now.
> drawing and designing is fun for me. but, I just see so many newbees designing
> ...


*John* you are 100% correct! There is now FREE CAD available and I use it just for kicks in designing things and many of those don't ever get made as many of them are basically a "what if" designs. I like to create something and take it all the way to photorealistic rendering … again, many times just for "kicks".

You are also correct in that many of the pros who do CAD for a living never really build what they design as that is up to the manufacturing groups and in many cases there are design changes needed to make the design manufacturable.

FREE CAD: 
FUSION 360
Creo Elements Direct Modeling Express
..... and maybe others

*Ricky M*, there are very few, if any, CAD applications that do not require at least a connection to a lisence server. One of my CAD apps allows 30 days of use before you have to get a lisence renewal.


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## Carl10 (Feb 24, 2017)

I think they may have changed the Fusion 360 model (or I just can't find the link) but the only free version of Fusion is for educators/students for a 3 year license. Otherwise it appears it is only a 30 day trial then $310/year. I couldn't find any reference to a hobbyist version and I didn't pursue it any further as my free Sketchup 2017 desktop version works great.

Carl


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## wormil (Nov 19, 2011)

John, wish I had the space for a drafting table. You can buy those machines on eBay.


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## Mike_D_S (May 3, 2012)

The Fusion360 hobby license is for the Start UP / Enthusiast license.

The link below talks about the 'Enthusiast' license which is free for small businesses with less than $100,000 per year annual revenue or for hobby uses for non-commercial applications.

In my case I applied for the small business free license and got it in one day with no issues.

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/fusion-360/learn-explore/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/How-to-activate-start-up-or-educational-licensing-for-Fusion-360.html

Mike


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

*Carl10*, you can qualify as a startup or hobbyist by using the student link on this page. 
That's what I did and the will ask you if you are a start up or hobbyist making less than $100k I believe. 
Both my son, not living in my home, and I took that route to down load the free version!

Here are the requirements for hobbyists near the bottom of the page.


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## Sanderguy777 (Feb 9, 2015)

Fusion 360 has a 3 year student educator package and an "positivly non profit" licence too. But I think 3 years is enough! Thank you Oldnovice for the fusion 360 idea, that's what I'm gonna use. The regular Sketchup download worked but I can't download my cloudbased file into it, so stuck on the cloud for this project…...

I have no problem with cloudbased. I love Adobe CC. But Adobe CC uses a download on your computer to give stability and then uploads the file to the cloud. 
100% cloudbased Sketchup on the other hand, uses an internet connection to funnel data to a server in real time. I find that with my not so great internet that there is significant lag (full seconds sometimes) and I can't view files on my phone (possibly can with an app, but haven't tried that yet). Also, I can't take the cloud based design into the older computer based program or print the design without a license (thank you windows for screenshots!)


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

You are very welcome *Sanderguy777*, we are all here to help each other!


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## Carl10 (Feb 24, 2017)

Thanks Mike & oldnovice,

I don't think I would have ever found that information without your links and information.

Thanks again. 
Carl


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## BobLang (Feb 2, 2009)

> Also, I can t take the cloud based design into the older computer based program or print the design without a license (thank you windows for screenshots!)
> 
> - Sanderguy777


Instead of downloading directly from SketchUp Free, put your model in the 3D Warehouse. From there you can download to your machine in older versions of SketchUp.


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## Sanderguy777 (Feb 9, 2015)

Bob: thanks. I was wondering if that was possible, but haven't had a chance to try it.


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## fromaway (Jan 22, 2013)

I was a Sketchup user (free version, Windows based) & loved it - it did everything I was looking for. I then moved to a MacBook and was still able to use Sketchup until my version was no longer supported and the then current version could not run on my MacBook. I reverted to John Smith's pen & paper solution.

I've now moved to an iPad Pro. Sketchup is not supported on an iPad Pro.

For any other iPad Pro users out there … what do you use for doing basic woodworking design? i.e. a Sketchup free equivalent?

I can't be the only one looking for this .. am I?

Cheers,
Bryan


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## RichT (Oct 14, 2016)

> For any other iPad Pro users out there … what do you use for doing basic woodworking design? i.e. a Sketchup free equivalent?
> 
> - fromaway


There are a few options. None are as powerful as SketchUp however.

Concepts: Targeted towards designers, architects, etc. Very complete feature set, but a big learning curve.

TouchDraw: Fairly complete CAD app. Dimensions, layers, etc. It has a Mac companion app.

Woodcraft: Not the store… It's an IOS app. It has a very unique interface. Reviewers either love it or hate it, more hate it than love it though. It uses a tool metaphor so that you take a piece of lumber and cut it to length rather than drawing it to length. It is most SketchUp-like in that it's fully 3D, gives you a cut list when you're done, etc. I got it for free when it first came out years ago. I've tried to like it, but it just never clicked. Also, it's $20, with no light version to try out.


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

I have *Fusion 360* on my *Galaxy Tab S*!
It is not the full version as it allows mark up, measurements, and colaboration.


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