this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2023
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For electrical engineering there is KiCad, which is pretty good overall. Only reason I'm still using proprietary software is because I'd have to recreate my libraries and it will be a huge pita.
For mechanical design there is FreeCad, which is usable for simple geometries, but if you come from a proprietary CAD software you may find it lacking.
I got into the 3D printing hobby a few months ago and FreeCAD is pretty much useless. I can be more productive by writing JavaScript code with Three.js library, lol.
For 3D printing, did you try OpenSCAD? If you're already a programmer it's much easier to get into than it is to get into any classic CAD software.
OpenSCAD has its uses, but would hardly classify it as full CAD software. Prusa, I believe, used OpenSCAD for a while but they even moved to Fusion360. FreeCAD would be great if the devs would stop trying to reinvent the wheel in their UI. There is a ton of potential, but it simply isn't where it needs to be yet.
Fusion360 or SolidWorks are very well established in that space and their shitty license models reflect that.
Still, as a free alternative, FreeCAD is where it's at. You just really need to understand if it will suit all of your needs and for me, it doesn't.
Yeah, it's quite bad as well. I'm using Fusion360 now.
I've made some great and somewhat complex designs using freecad, it's certainly capable.
I eventually switched to fusion 360 because of the UI and it's more easy to find help. And less need to find help
Yep, that's my experience as well. It works, but man... You're just wasting time fighting the app instead of designing your models.
For that you can also use Blender
Not really. Blender is NOT a CAD. It doesn't ensure that your bodies are solid, it doesn't provide any analysis tools, it doesn't support working with blueprints/sketches, it's not parametric, etc. Basically, it doesn't do anything CAD at all.
Yeah, it's a great tool for the job. Not as good as Zbrush, but I used it for print prep several times and it just has all the tools you might need.