Cheap CAD software?

[Neuraleanus]

I need an easy to use and cheap, either freeware or shareware, CAD program so that I may make some engineering drawings. What can people recommend? I've been collecting books on roman surveying and I want to make drawings for the parts of a roman groma. An interesting aside that I've come across is that the famous Pompeii groma is incorrectly assembled.

A quick search has alerted me to QCAD which is opensource and costs only $28 USA. Has anyone used this?

[Tarbicus]

Check these sites out for freeware and shareware:

[url:3cxtgitk]http://www.3dlinks.com/links.cfm?categoryid=1&subcategoryid=68[/url]

[url:3cxtgitk]http://freeware.intrastar.net/cadsoftware.htm[/url]

[url:3cxtgitk]http://www.brothersoft.com/Multimedia_Graphics_CAD_Download_List_1.html[/url]

[url:3cxtgitk]http://www.caddprimer.com/Free_CAD_software/cad_shareware_freeware.htm[/url]

[url:3cxtgitk]http://www.amazing3d.com/softfree.html[/url]

I'd recommend going for one which is a cutdown version of an established and popular app. That way there should be more online help and tips should you run into an inevitable problem.

[Neuraleanus]

I'm currently going through the tutorials for Alibre Design Xpress. It looks like this will do everything that I want and it's free.

[mcbishop]

I need an easy to use and cheap, either freeware or shareware, CAD program so that I may make some engineering drawings. What can people recommend? I've been collecting books on roman surveying and I want to make drawings for the parts of a roman groma. An interesting aside that I've come across is that the famous Pompeii groma is incorrectly assembled.

A quick search has alerted me to QCAD which is opensource and costs only $28 USA. Has anyone used this?

QCAD is actually free (as in beer) if you get it with a Linux distro - there are various ones that will boot from CD (like Ubuntu, Mepis, Knoppix etc etc) and these days you don't even have to switch off Windoze to do it. Install VMPlayer (also free as in beer) and run a CD from there within Windoze (of course Real Men run Windoze from within Linux...). Have a look at some of the Virtual Machines on the VMWare site - there must be at least one that includes QCAD. Strictly speaking, IIRC QCAD is only open sourced for older versions and requires compiling if you don't use a pre-built Linux version, the lastest still requiring dosh, but check their website.

Mike Bishop

[Tarbicus]

(of course Real Men run Windoze from within Linux...)

Sounds a bit like turning a glider into a helicopter to me... More bits to drop off and cause a crash, and the bits were only taped to the fuselage in the first place :wink:

[Arthes]

http://www.3d-rekonstruktionen.de/bricksntiles/ :lol: :lol: :lol:

[mcbishop]

(of course Real Men run Windoze from within Linux...)

Sounds a bit like turning a glider into a helicopter to me... More bits to drop off and cause a crash, and the bits were only taped to the fuselage in the first place :wink:

You're always causing trouble, you. I bet you think Paintshop is a really neat application... ;-)

Gliders are covered in tape (wing roots, hingey bit of all control surfaces, around inspection panels - there's a very good aerodynamic reason for it... which I suspect was invented by tape manufacturers).* It also keeps the vital piece of wool in place on the canopy. Oh, and helicopters will glide, after a fashion. Come on, it does say Off Topic so I feel duty bound to oblige...

Mike Bishop

*It's actually one of the many and varied forms of drag but I'm too tired to bother to try to remember which.