I'm quite happy with FreeCAD. It's not really intuitive but I'll gladly take that over any other program with those modern account/subscription/cloud bullshit "features".
It looks like Fusion 360 runs fine on Linux these days, I don’t know how reliable that is in practice (I would expect not very much).
OnShape is a great option if the licensing terms are compatible with what you are doing. They used to have similar licensing terms as Fusion 360 where you could still get paid for your work with a free version (i.e. YouTube) but changed the terms to remove this loophole. Fusion still allows this with the Startup license but of course could change their mind at any time, then you’d be out of luck.
I dislike the lockdown of Fusion 360 but its mental model works with my own (I can’t “get” SolidWorks and never remember how to do anything). Speaking of SolidWorks, they added a reasonably-priced license for DIY/hobbyists, but it’s the same lockdown as Fusion 360 and still Windows only.
I’m in the same boat as you, just a hobbyist doing this for my own use, I have no interest in becoming an industrial engineer. For now I will keep using Fusion 360, and when that stops being an option I’ll move on to something else. I can whip out models for my prints easily enough and the 10 documents limit is just an annoyance, not a real limitation.
At the very least whatever you design in Fusion 360 or OnShape won’t be stuck in there, you can export it out via .step files. You lose design history (if applicable) but not the model itself.
I should have prefaced that I did not actually run this myself, but I did take a note of it, it looked promising. Sorry for the false hope!
I would expect it to work after a lot of fussing about, and then break at the slightest update. Easier to run it in a VM (which is also not easy in order to get GPU acceleration without dedicating a card to it - I never managed to get Intel GVT-g nor GVT-d to work reliably).
Yup. At this point, "locally installed, reliable, parametric modeling on Linux" = "FreeCAD, including Ondsel, and SolveSpace". That's it. Well, there's code-to-CAD as well, which obviously retains parametric history, but goes about it very differently than a design tree.
For non-parametric modeling, BricsCAD and Plasticity enter the discussion. For parametric on the web, OnShape works very well but I hate their licensing scheme and the huge doughnut hole in their pricing model.
I was quite amazed reading NopHead’s blog a while back because he uses OpenSCAD exclusively, even managing to design an entire printer and its upgrades in there. I didn’t think any sane person could do this.
I could never get his repo to work, I've resigned to using fusion in a VM for now while I wait for progress in freecad or the parametric cad plugins for blender to mature.
I recently tried the flatpak this repo has linked and couldn't get it to work properly. First I had to google for a login workaround because the bottle couldn't open the browser login link and when I finally got it to "work" the rendering was broken.
Although you still need windows, Rhino3D is amazing and has a perpetual license. It's way cheaper if you are studying or teaching. There is also sketchup which works through the browser but I don't know if that works on Linux.
Having tried similar things, I cannot stress enough how much you want to be printing molds like this in TPU unless you really really want your mold to be permanently embedded in the concrete
I really hope that FreeCAD will get better with time, and the Blender story will be the same for FreeCAD. Just a few years back, Blender was really bad compared with Maya, now Autodesk lost a huge market because Blender is powerful enough for professional work, probably even better than Maya
I'm really hoping FreeCAD gets the Blender treatment. ONDSEL is already pushing it pretty far, but once extensibility is more robust and the new user experience improved, I believe that'll be the tipping point.
Oh man "extensibility" in FreeCAD. The documentation is non-existent, is the main problem. It's just about impossible to understand how anything works, it's like trying to figure out how to run a battleship by turning cranks and seeing what they do.
My point exactly. If FreeCAD refines that framework and documents it well, community plugin support could drive many new features and quality of life improvements into the main branch.
Smooth the surface? Looks like that texture is from your plate? A smooth pei plate will give you a smoother bottom surface. If you want the top even smoother use ironing. Printing with tpu will give anti-slip properties.
The coasters are double sided.
The printer is not mine and they dont have a smooth PEI plate.
I want the same texture on both sides, so im hoping to do some post processing.
If you want an identical texture from the plate on both sides, you could split your model in two laterally and print both finished faces downwards against the plate, and then glue/screw/pin/otherwise attach the two halves together afterwards.
Doing this with an inlay for the two colors would be possible, i.e. with a filament change on the same layer. If your colored bit is a separate layer on top of the other stuff that plan won't be possible.
That could be an option, but ill look into the anti slip pads and i have also found "clear plastidip" online and ill see if i can make a nice coasters surface with that.
You're four forks deep now
Slic3r to Prusa Slicer to Bamboo's slicer to Orca. It also borrowed a lot of ideas from Super Slicer. Since it's open source, and has been gaining some momentum, it seems to have a decent amount of contributors
Why Orca?
all the features you know and love from things up the tree
a revamped UI
built in tuning tests (temp tower, extrusion multiplier, volumetric flow, pressure advance, etc)
The UI of Prusa slicer is hot garbage though. I started with prusa slicer and moved to orca after a few months. Orca is a much nicer experience, and the built-in test-models (temp towers etc.) are nice.
In find the location and grouping of parameters more intuitive in orca. I always had to look through several tabs to find the parameter I wanted to adjust when I was using prusa, it was never where I thought it should be.
I only use pretty basic modelling, and have no interest in advanced CAD featueres, I've tried both the link branch and ondsel, and I honesty think they're about the same level as regular freecad. None of them are even near as intuitive to use as for example onshape, they're actually a bit of a chore to use IME.
You only need an account if you want access their cloud storage and sharing management. You can get a tiny free account if you want. I signed up for the freebie since I sometimes work between 2 computers on the same project. But if you only use one computer, it's not going to get you anything extra.
You can add Ondsel Lens to your regular install simply by installing it through the add-on manager if you want.
I think each person has to recognize that there is a time/energy cost to get out of enshittification hell, and then decide how much they're willing to pay. If the answer for you is at least "an afternoon of video tutorials", then Freecad will be fine for you. It's a complicated tool that you need some help learning; that's ok. It won't become your new hobby.
If you don't want to pay that cost, that's understandable. If you feel mad that there is a cost at all, that's ok too. That's how enshittification works, and it sucks. As I said, each person will have to decide whether and how much they're willing to pay to get out of it.
Anyway, the MangoJelly tutorials in YouTube are really excellent, and will have you up and running in a few hours at most. (My CAD needs are also very basic, and I was done after the first two parts, 30 min each.) For following along, I would recommend just using the main version, so that it matches his tutorial exactly, and do the steps as he shows you. It feels dumb, but it's such a fast way to learn. You can decide later if you want to switch to one of the other branches, depending on what features you care about or what annoys you most.
The feature freeze is on and they have a UI overhaul and a Topological Naming Problem fix.
I am using the 0.22 dev version with the fix and oh boy it makes a huge difference. Obviously deleting a face where there was a feature attached to results in an error still. It makes it viable to use the mainline instead of realthunder fork.
I found Freecad has become fairly intuitive if you already have traditional parametric cad experience, there's definitely a few quirks but generally super easy to adapt to if you come from solidworks, inventor and the like, trying to convince my dad to give it a try as he's been getting back into design since retiring and he's been paying for a solid works license. Personally use ondsel but mainline freecad is totally useable.
I like "Solvespace" myself. It's simpler than FreeCAD and works better with the way I think of things (more focus on 2D planes). I don't do the "scan and sketch" thing though so can't speak to that. Might be worth a try.
@JohnnyCanuck@the_fourth not a CAD. Can be sort-of made one, but not ideal. Something like FreeCAD is better but both Fusion and Onshape are much better in terms of UX.
Cadsketcher was much easier for me to pick up for designing simple parts. Still haven’t used it for anything too complicated but I couldn’t get over the FreeCAD quirks like not being able to do multiple extrudes from the same sketch.
Personally I love openSCAD, but it is probably really unintuitive to someone without programming experience and even then has it's own limitations.
FreeCAD is in a weird position ATM, it is actually really good! ...just not in the stable release... The Dev version is significantly more palatable, and they even went on a feature freeze to really push through with their major 1.0 release.
For now though Onsdel (Sort of a fork of FreeCAD packaged with Dev release and UI improvements) has worked really well for me thus far!
Is there a good tutorial or better yet, videos showing how to use ondsel? When I tried to use it, everything pointed at free car and the ui was too different.
I am not certain, I have used FreeCAD tutorials for Onsdel to great success.
I think what I do is just listen to the tool name they reference, and then just look where I assume it would be to find it, rather than trying to find tools in the same places as them
That sounds about right. QA is expensive and time consuming, so it's left up to the customer. This applies to every single part in the supply chain.
If you want a set of mitsumi linear rails for real precision applications, it's going to cost just as much or more than that printer.
This is not a "buyer beware" rant, but the buyer should know they aren't paying for consistency or precision. I am basically saying that for these printers to work reliably and with proper precision, you need to tear them down yourself and inspect each bolt.
I buy cheap Chinese stuff all the time, but my process is to tear the product down and find where costs were cut and look for any serious dangers.
Svol is well known enough that you should be able to get replacement bits for free. Or not. It's a crap shoot, TBH.
I think with a lot of import products you need to be aware that you'll be doing the QA and will in fact be working on the parts / product to get it to where you need it to be.
If you have the skills and the tools $280 + $3 for an unfinished pulley plus some time on the lathe or mill can still be worth it. I know this is asking a lot from a customer and maybe this particular example of a printer is not the best, i. e. it would totally be possible to manufacture this part within specs at cost, but I think the general notion still holds true.
you'll be doing the QA and will in fact be working on the parts / product to get it to where you need it to be.
Absolutely. Unless a person wants to spend thousands of dollars on push button solutions that cover every imaginable use case, customization is the way to go.
For solid machines, the customer should already have an idea about what parts need to be modified. If a machine was advertised to mill a widget at +/-20% tolerance, cool. If you want to spend $500 more on a custom pully to get withing 5%, awesome. Precision is expensive and customization is niche.
For cheap machines, everything is generally ravaged by bean counters at every level of design and manufacturing. As long as people understand this and can make repairs, that is sometimes OK.
While I feel OPs pain of finding a 2¢ part that was 0.3mm off center, I can only just shrug it off. A pseudo-premium 5¢ part or building a jig for a worker to test each gear would have been quite expensive and it would probably tack on $2-$5 to the end product price. ($2-$5 actually matters on sites like Amazon or Temu and could potentially cost thousands in lost sales due to product placement.)
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