> "I have a box and the box needs to connect to another box"
I have gotten more elaborate shapes like gears and screws with OpenSCAD, but I will admit for more elaborate projects I use BowlerStudio since I find found it easier to use some of the JavaCAD stuff.
I've just never been able to get the hang of mouse controls, even in Fusion 360; in SCAD if I need to extrude a bizarre shape, I will occasionally draw the thing into an SVG, import it into SCAD and linear extrude from there.
The rendering time is a fair complaint though; with complicated models, especially with a high $fn value, re-rendering can be pretty slow. I don't really have a good response to that, I just put up with it because I feel the other perks of code-based CAD make up for it.;
Obviously to each their own. I do wish that code-based CAD is better but I'm not a mechanical engineer, just an enthusiast with a 3D printer.
> I've just never been able to get the hang of mouse controls, even in Fusion 360
I can relate to this -- I would consider myself 3D-clumsy. But learning the various navigation tools in FreeCAD (numbered views, the navigation cube, the new orient-to-face option) has helped me a lot.
And I think fundamentally not being so intimidated by the rest of the package means it's more worth persevering with that stuff.
(Also FreeCAD's trackpad+keyboard gestures are basically usable)
> Obviously to each their own. I do wish that code-based CAD is better but I'm not a mechanical engineer, just an enthusiast with a 3D printer.
Indeed. It's fabulous that we have choices in open source CAD, open source slicers, open source printers. It's just wild to me -- it actually makes me emotional -- that I can make some of the things I want from my thoughts at such low cost.
But do check out Build123D; I think it will get you to another level.
Yeah, I see Build123D being referenced a lot here. I'll give it a try, though I suspect I'll probably stick with Bowler Studio because I actually use the physics and robo simulation stuff a lot.
Bowler Studio was entirely new to me, so thanks for mentioning it.
One random mention: Nick Lockwood's ShapeScript, which is another code-CAD thing based around a mesh CSG environment (and pretty unusually runs on iOS)
Bowler Studio was sort of revelatory for me, because it gave me the ability to model a functional part and immediately test it. The physics engine obviously isn't going to be the most accurate of all time, but for a lot stuff that hobbyists do it can be useful, and being able to play with servos and motors really does open a lot of possibilities to avoid wasting time and prints.
I've actually played with ShapeScript but I admit that I didn't do anything terribly crazy with it.
Yeah I've only dabbled with it myself. Again it was part of this process of me orienting myself towards "thinking in 3D" and I'm really grateful to much more 3D-literate developers than me that we have so many choices.
This is a browser-based JS CAD thing built around an Emscripten cross-compilation of OpenCascade -- the fact that it works at all was revelatory to me about the capability of Emscripten, which had passed me by a little.
I have gotten more elaborate shapes like gears and screws with OpenSCAD, but I will admit for more elaborate projects I use BowlerStudio since I find found it easier to use some of the JavaCAD stuff.
I've just never been able to get the hang of mouse controls, even in Fusion 360; in SCAD if I need to extrude a bizarre shape, I will occasionally draw the thing into an SVG, import it into SCAD and linear extrude from there.
The rendering time is a fair complaint though; with complicated models, especially with a high $fn value, re-rendering can be pretty slow. I don't really have a good response to that, I just put up with it because I feel the other perks of code-based CAD make up for it.;
Obviously to each their own. I do wish that code-based CAD is better but I'm not a mechanical engineer, just an enthusiast with a 3D printer.