[HN Gopher] CADing and 3D printing like a software engineer
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CADing and 3D printing like a software engineer
Author : bo0tzz
Score : 89 points
Date : 2024-12-12 12:38 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (fangpenlin.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (fangpenlin.com)
| rekttrader wrote:
| OpenSCAD is your friend.
| fragmede wrote:
| OpenSCAD feels very dated, not only due to the editor and the
| fonts used, but shortcomings due to language limitations when
| coming from other software, but it works.
| Klaster_1 wrote:
| I had much better experience with a VSCode and anOpenSCAD
| extension compared to the stitch editor. Pair that with the
| latest master build for extra performance.
| wickedsight wrote:
| Also the fact that sometimes things can take ages to render.
|
| I did have some fun results getting ChatGPT to create
| OpenSCAD scripts. It created a fully functional parametric
| christmas tree for me, which I thought was kinda cool.
| gotts wrote:
| how big are your assemblies? I had some issues on large
| assemblies but after Manifold rendering release it became
| much much faster.
| tliltocatl wrote:
| There is also https://github.com/mirmik/zencad. Full Python
| and OpenCASCADE core, so feels less quirky than OpenSCAD.
| throw646577 wrote:
| Is it? IMO sticking with OpenSCAD is fundamentally limiting
| your progress with modelling for 3D printing. It's not CAD.
|
| Simple parts, yes. Geometry and trigonometry demos? Yes. Actual
| computer-aided design... no not really.
| Joel_Mckay wrote:
| In some ways, but for off axis parabolic mirrors with
| internal geometry Openscad seemed to work fine. Additionally,
| the parametric formats are fundamentally necessary when
| working in plastics which tend to shift around during
| additive manufacturing.
|
| I like that OpenScad integrates into FreeCad, and can do more
| than lousy STL outputs. It is far from perfect, but can solve
| some problems with ease.
|
| Most cloud based software strips one of long-term stability
| in the design folder (can no longer store a version snapshot
| of the project binary dependencies), and so poses a liability
| to any firm running large infrastructures.
|
| For one-off stuff, one could argue it doesn't matter. But in
| someways, FreeCad beside the project files will be
| viewable/exportable forever.
|
| Unfortunately, now the Solidworks offline workflow also
| requires the online license nag screen every 30 days.
| However, it is not part of Autodesks walled garden built on
| internet stability (a significant issue in a remote field
| deployment.)
|
| Good luck, =3
| throw646577 wrote:
| Oh I'm a FreeCAD person anyway.
|
| OpenSCAD was a useful stepping stone for me, from
| programming to 3D. But I've been doing my own designs in
| FreeCAD for two and a half years or so.
|
| I just think the typical groundswell of HN support for
| OpenSCAD is a bit misguided; it sort of relies on near-
| wilfully ignoring what GUI CAD -- even FreeCAD -- can do
| for one's designs.
|
| Yes, it's good for simple geometry, and some more advanced
| mathematical geometry. But it boxes you in pretty quickly
| because you cannot easily compose geometry based on the
| outputs of previous operations.
| Joel_Mckay wrote:
| The elephant in the room is the modular nature of
| FreeCAD. Unlike most cloud offerings, one can expand the
| capabilities with your own toolbox in a standard language
| like Python.
|
| We actually recommended FreeCad as a core to a small
| medical device manufacturer looking for a custom solution
| to dynamically tweak their process. i.e. even a simple
| workbench plugin that takes a few variables to generate a
| simple manifold, and CAM to gcode in the same program...
| was a huge benefit for users now locked out of Autodesk
| and Solidworks walled ecosystems.
|
| Ideal? No... Practical? You bet...
|
| Best of luck =3
| throw646577 wrote:
| Right. I think if you're not reliant on a few generalist
| operations where opencascade is weak --- it is not great
| at very marginal fillets/chamfers/thicknesses --- then
| FreeCAD is probably a good way to get programmatic, GUI
| access to OCC. It's not the only way, of course, but it's
| getting towards being stable.
| chasd00 wrote:
| I've used openscad and some of my friends swear by it. I
| eventually just bit the bullet and climbed the fusion360
| learning curve. Everything has been smooth sailing once over
| that hump.
| criddell wrote:
| Right now you can get a year of SolidWorks for Makers for $24.
|
| If all you've ever used is OpenSCAD or OpenCascade-based
| software, you are in for a pleasant surprise.
| i_am_a_squirrel wrote:
| I just went through this journey, except I learned freecad.
|
| You end up having to click and enter so many numbers if you need
| exact dimensions, so I'm planning on switching to cadquery.
|
| It would be cool to make a framework for modifying cadquery code
| with natural language, for example "make box 1 and box 1 flush"
| or "create two concentric semi-spheres and subtract the smaller
| one from the larger one"
|
| But idk, maybe once you're fast at fusion this kinda stuff is
| faster to hotkey than speak
| Klaster_1 wrote:
| Have you tried the new VarSet in 1.0? I found it more ergonomic
| than the old spreadsheet approach. With a formulas first
| approach, I find the modeling flow more controllable. Come to
| think about it, it starts to resemble a view/model arrangement
| I am used as a frontend dev.
| throw646577 wrote:
| VarSet has an incomplete GUI but you're right it's a better
| fit; it has fewer massive recalculation bombs than the
| Spreadsheet approach (and it can still AFAIK work as an
| interface to a configuration table sheet).
|
| The Spreadsheet module is awesome (particularly configuration
| tables, which I used even in one of my first serious designs)
| but I still don't really know why my model has to recalculate
| because I changed the background colour in a cell. That seems
| to me to be unnecessarily deep integration.
| tony69 wrote:
| Claude can write cadquery, worked well for me
| xemoka wrote:
| I've had such a hard time with Claude and cadquery/build123d;
| did you do anything specific to get better results? I tried
| turning the examples into a markdown document to feed into
| sonnet as part of the prompt, and that helped a bit, but
| still couldn't get it to build basic parts reliably.
| freeqaz wrote:
| I've been 3D printing slinkies (helical coils) and I used
| build123d for it. Somebody on HN recommended it as a first pass
| if you don't know CAD.
|
| It's a little rough but I was able to get it to do what I needed
| it to! Here's my code: https://github.com/freeqaz/light-coil-
| model
|
| Let me know if you want one. They're pretty rad!
| fragmede wrote:
| Can you do other shapes of slinkies, not just circles?
| bravetraveler wrote:
| I've seen mass-produced ones in various shapes. For instance,
| stars. OP probably could, not _especially_ complicated.
|
| Notably worse at the act of _' slinking'_. Would tangle like
| no other!
| freeqaz wrote:
| Yes haha exactly. I'm sure I could figure out the code to
| slinkify any object which would be pretty fun
|
| For a non-circle that still works for slinky purposes, I'm
| sure some sort of geometric prism would be cool. Maybe I'll
| take a crack at it over winter break!
| randomghost1 wrote:
| Hey, shameless plug in case you are interested.
|
| We're building this AI copilot for Fusion 360 called MechAI. Like
| a SWE, it enables you to store files on GitHub in JSON format
| with diffs, merging, etc. ;).
|
| Beta coming out soon, check out the demos and waitlist on our
| website: https://www.trymechai.com/.
| gotts wrote:
| functional programming is such an (semantically) overloaded term,
| it means completely different things to different people. Each
| time I read it in a blog post/tweet it makes comprehension
| slightly more difficult.
| throw646577 wrote:
| In this case the poster is not actually going that far off the
| reservation.
|
| A parametric CAD package starts off with some variables, makes
| 2D representations of them that can be solved by a constraint
| solver, extends those 2D representations into a third dimension
| parametrically, connects 2D representations to earlier
| generated geometry etc.
|
| If you change an early parametric variable, it ripples through
| the design because the design is a directed graph (indeed, CAD
| designers often run into situations where they have tried to do
| things which would create a cycle in a graph -- use the
| dimensions of a subsequent part in an earlier part, which the
| CAD package cannot solve).
|
| Most of the core calculations involved are functional in this
| regard -- for example a 2D sketch to a 3D extrusion, a 2D
| sketch to a sweep along a path.
| willvarfar wrote:
| Of course this title triggers me and I need to share/rant about
| my own programming struggles with CAD :) Sorry
|
| Coming at the problem from another end, I have have been
| designing dream houses as a hobby but have been struggling and
| frustrated by the current CAD and 3D editors.
|
| There are a lot of drawing-house-plans apps like SweetHome3D and
| Homestyler etc, and they are all really good at getting some wall
| lines down quickly, but quickly start to get hard to do anything
| advanced and all give up on real roofs and attics.
|
| From the other end there is Sketchup, which is both good and easy
| yet also difficult to control.
|
| The general advice for people wanting to see a house design in 3D
| is to draw the plan in some house plan software then save that as
| a jpg and import that into sketchup and then to build the walls
| on top of the drawing etc.
|
| Of course, being a programmer, I had some ideas... and have about
| a dozen abandoned starts on a house drawing program that actually
| understands that 'this is a wall, and this is how thick walls
| are' etc.
|
| The openscad approach is good and I have some routines that do
| sensible tricky roofing angles and things, but you can't really
| go and and parameterise whole houses. Its a nut that still hasn't
| cracked.
|
| I've watched and talked with a lot of architects and tbh they are
| sketching and treating their CAD as a bunch of lines rather than
| the CAD knowing what walls and beams really are.
| josiahpeters wrote:
| I used Home Designer -
| https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/products/home-designer-...
| to draw a house we purchased (built in the 1970s) and the
| changes we intended to make during a remodel. The person
| reviewing my permit application was very impressed that I
| showed up with proper plans and not some kind of sketch done
| hastily on a napkin.
|
| It definitely tries to think about walls, rooms, windows,
| floors as they are meant to be modeled. You can even get a
| materials estimate based on the properties of the wall.
| Suppafly wrote:
| I think a bigger problem with these DIY home design apps is
| that you have no idea which ones are worth using or not until
| you've already bought them and then run into a road block
| they couldn't fix.
| Qqqwxs wrote:
| Is paid software OK? Have you looked at Revit?
| poulpy123 wrote:
| Revit is 3300EUR/yr... You have to be very rich to be OK with
| this kind of price for a hobby
| an_aparallel wrote:
| You have a few options: _Freecad with Architecture
| workbenches._ Rhino (used by most architects for exploratory
| modelling) *BlenderBIM (its called something else now)
|
| If you're talking to architects and they're talking about
| Autocad, and lines...they may be of the old guard. Most
| large/modern projects are Revit based. TBH any engineering
| drafting in 2024 using autocad is ridiculous. Something which
| takes 1-2 hours in a parametric modeller can take a day! Co-
| ordinating architecture, project management, structural
| engineering, facade engineering, and MEP specialties is non
| existent in Autocad - Revit is built for this.
|
| Revit is built to "know" and "understand"...is more or less the
| de-facto standard for building information modelling. If your
| pockets are deep enough - i'd recommend it - they have an LT
| (light) version which is more affordable and may do everything
| you want - but it's still pretty expensive for a fun little
| side project.
| michaelt wrote:
| _> If you 're talking to architects and they're talking about
| Autocad, and lines...they may be of the old guard. [...] any
| engineering drafting in 2024 using autocad is ridiculous._
|
| At least in my country, there are a lot of small-project
| architects.
|
| You're converting a loft into a bedroom? Building an
| extension to your house? You'll need to do the calculations
| to make sure the beam holding up the roof is strong enough,
| and some paperwork so the inspector can see the calculations
| have been performed, and enough plans that the builders know
| what to build. Basic requirements that AutoCAD can take care
| of just fine.
|
| And of course these small-project architects are the only
| architects 99% of people will ever work with - far fewer
| people will ever work with an architect on a 100+ person
| building.
| an_aparallel wrote:
| Indeed - Revit is overkill for smaller projects :)
| atoav wrote:
| I thought immidiately: "CAD for programmers? This _has_ to be
| about OpenSCAD /CadQuery or the likes", but no.
|
| So if you want (need) to create parametric CAD parts and can
| program this might interest you:
| https://cadquery.readthedocs.io/en/latest/quickstart.html#qu...
|
| I e.g. used it to create parametric electronic parts for
| visualizations of printed circuit boards where modelling each
| slightly differently sized variant manually was too much effort.
| jakeogh wrote:
| Also see https://github.com/gumyr/build123d (which is closely
| related to CadQuery, my understanding is it's successor). I
| used b123d for a project this year and it turned out perfect.
| When I need to make a change, editing some version controlled
| py and watching the model update is very satisfying.
|
| Best resources to get a feel of why programmatic parametric
| modeling is so interesting:
|
| https://cq-warehouse.readthedocs.io/en/latest/fastener.html
|
| https://bd-warehouse.readthedocs.io/en/latest/index.html
| atoav wrote:
| Thanks for the tip, a pain point with cadquery was the
| installation so if b123d manages to solve that it is worth
| checking out.
| throw646577 wrote:
| I like OpenSCAD for what it is good for: limited, geometrically
| simple parts and geometry demos.
|
| I think CadQuery/Build123D are fine tools with much better
| abstractions than OpenSCAD. The latter is not, IMO, really a
| CAD tool at all; at no point does the Computer Aid the Design,
| in the CAD sense, whereas you can argue that the various
| OpenCascade code-CAD environments can at least expose generated
| geometry to code.
|
| But the post is right: parametric GUI CAD is pretty much a
| visual analogue of functional programming. Once you get your
| head around the ways sketches or their equivalents can map onto
| existing geometry, a lot of the ways programmers think are very
| applicable to CAD.
|
| You're basically working with a directed graph, which means you
| can do things like drive designs from parameter sets, or
| spreadsheets, and e.g. in FreeCA drive some variables from
| configuration tables (rows in a spreadsheet with different
| parameter sets) so you can make variations of objects.
|
| As much as I think code-CAD has uses, especially perhaps for
| analysing and post-processing STEP files for download
| customisers, at this point someone with parametric CAD
| requirements should at least try a GUI CAD package like FreeCAD
| or any of the free/low-cost tiers of the commercial packages.
| FreeCAD can do OpenSCAD, and has a (verbose) Python layer, so
| it's accessible to code CAD.
|
| The tools may initially be a little frustrating for programmers
| used to writing code, athough IMO less frustrating than the
| many quirks and significant limitations of OpenSCAD. But CAD
| methodology is logical and scaleable, and with a little
| learning you will be able to do things much more quickly and
| much less repetitively than OpenSCAD, which admittedly is a
| counterintuitive claim to a programmer.
|
| I think programmers tend to think that GUI CAD must be to code-
| CAD what visual programming tools are to text IDEs: unnecessary
| fuss keeping you from the truth. But it's really not like that.
| sebazzz wrote:
| OpenSCAD is almost akin to writing assembly. So many things
| you would expect like in a higher-level language (FreeCAD,
| Fusion) are missing (like fillets and things like that). You
| onle have primitives and primitive operations to work with.
| throw646577 wrote:
| It's frustratingly like that and not like that.
|
| For example, you cannot write a routine that says "get me
| the edges of this object generated by this other routine,
| and apply a 1mm fillet to them all". Because while the code
| manipulates geometry, the result is not geometry. The
| result is a 3D approximated picture of the geometry
| _rendered in another form of geometry_.
|
| To do anything like operate on result vertexes or edges you
| have to replicate the result geometry, by hand, in data
| structures in the code.
|
| So it is not just fillets as an operation that are missing.
| It is any notion of being able to access the edges that you
| would wish to fillet.
|
| This is why I think OpenSCAD does not "aid design" in the
| CAD sense. It does nothing but compile your wishes into a
| mesh. The most basic notion of "aiding design" ought to be
| exposing the result _geometry_ of one operation so it can
| be used as the variable input for another.
|
| Is it good for quickly understanding basic geometry or
| displaying the results of formulae? Yeah. Undeniably so.
| alhirzel wrote:
| I thought this would be about OpenSCAD as well. Thanks for the
| reference to CadQuery!
| synack wrote:
| I had the same problem with my webcam and solved it with 3d
| printing:
| https://www.printables.com/model/370558-logitech-c920-shim
| hurtuvac78 wrote:
| I have been using Blender to design 3D models, since I had some
| knowledge of it. Wondering why not more people are using it for
| CAD. Are the other tools much better? Why?
| tliltocatl wrote:
| It's perfect for artistic stuff, but for technical you would
| rather use something that is oriented towards CSG (so that non-
| manifold topology is no longer an issue). Then you want edit
| tree, so that you don't have to redo all of the work to change
| one little thing in the beginning, and then parametric
| modelling and a constrain solver.
| an_aparallel wrote:
| Blender is a bunch of things - but it is not, 1)a parametric
| program. 2)deals with complex geometry as mesh, VS nurbs 3)
| isnt really built to dimension 4)isnt really built for
| generating documentation which 99% of teh time is primary
| output of these programs - 2d sheets.
|
| You can use it for 3d printing - but for engineering...nope.
| The Autodesk family of products / Solidworks are defacto for a
| reason - they have decades of tooling, libraries and so on that
| make lightwork of complex tasks. I'd tear my hair out trying to
| do my work in Blender which i easily do in Inventor, Autocad or
| Revit.
| Joel_Mckay wrote:
| There are constraint based CAD addons for blender, and the
| black art of Geometry node rendering pipelines to auto-
| generate objects/features. There is also the fact most of the
| system is open Python API based, and thus everything can be
| generated from code.
|
| However, Blender was not meant to be a constraint based
| CAD/CAM package.
|
| Solidworks still seems like the leader in offline mode, but
| parametric-everything FreeCad is evolving at an astonishing
| rate.
|
| For critical professional work, gambling on opensource is
| still inappropriate most of the time. =3
| an_aparallel wrote:
| I'm keen on trying freecad 1.0. After professional training
| in engineering drafting, I'm interested to see if I can get
| by with a lot more understanding of the processes.
| throw646577 wrote:
| You can get CAD Sketcher for Blender which might help.
|
| But Blender is a mesh manipulation environment. Ideal for
| designing 3D models to go in virtual environments. Not awful
| for 3D models that are only going to a 3D printer, but
| fundamentally not the right tool for CAD for general
| manufacturing, because it cannot natively produce STEP-type
| geometry.
| ansgri wrote:
| Bambu and Fusion360 sure look nice, but if you're on tighter
| budget, 3D printers became both cheaper and more reliable in
| general, and FreeCAD recently got to 1.0 and is quite capable.
|
| I worked alongside people using early versions of Makerbot and
| Ultimaker, and those were a maintenance nightmare. But recently I
| got a Kobra 2 Pro for $200, and it's both more capable and easier
| to use than those old monsters. With PLA it's pretty much hassle-
| free, no need to tweak anything except print orientation and
| maybe some support options.
| S0und wrote:
| Fusion360 has a free tier and it's enough for most people.
| zihotki wrote:
| Freecad is fully free and after 1.0 release it's enough for
| most people.
| grumbel wrote:
| The Fusion360 free-tier has been getting ever more
| restrictive over time. At the moment it is at:
|
| > users who generate less than $1,000 USD in annual revenue
| and use for home-based, non-commercial projects only.
|
| Which already makes it unsuitable for any Open Source work.
| While one might still accept those restrictions for quick
| one-off projects, those projects are also the ones that
| FreeCAD can handle fine.
| Mumps wrote:
| and only 10 editable projects :/
| baby_souffle wrote:
| Editable files! A project might have tens of files in it
| and you'll find yourself having to toggle which ones are
| in the active set. It's maddening!
| throw646577 wrote:
| I had no idea it was at this fine-grained a level.
| chasd00 wrote:
| I do a lot in amateur rocketry and took the fusion360 route.
| One thing that's nice about it is its popularity. Whenever I
| have questions most of the other people in my hobby are ready
| with answers or guidance.
| Scene_Cast2 wrote:
| I switched off of Fusion360 on to OnShape when Autodesk
| started mucking around with the free tier.
| ehnto wrote:
| I haven't maintained my Ender3 since setting it up first, then
| tuning it. It just keeps printing good prints forblike 4 years
| now. I don't even think about it, pop in the file and walk
| away. I don't even level the bed. Sometimes it's months between
| prints and it still just works.
|
| I print mostly practical parts so perfection isn't really
| needed but the finish has been great regardless. The only
| issues I have had is the bed eventually peeled up after enough
| PETG prints with no bed prep.
| MetaWhirledPeas wrote:
| > FreeCAD recently got to 1.0 and is quite capable
|
| FreeCAD _is_ capable and is indeed free, but as a beginner
| designing something somewhat complex it really led me into
| building a rat 's nest of a project that I found difficult to
| salvage. The rough edges and general flaky behavior did not
| help things, and I found almost none of the user interface
| intuitive. If I had to do it over again I'd choose F360 or
| Onshape.
| Suppafly wrote:
| >FreeCAD is capable and is indeed free
|
| It seems to put off even people who are interested in
| learning CAD or are already familiar with CAD. It's telling
| that the best description people can come up with is "capable
| and free" instead of "easy to use".
| throw646577 wrote:
| It shouldn't, probably. Is it a bit rough around the edges?
| Yes it surely is. But 1.0 is pretty solid.
|
| I don't know why it particularly needs to be the freely
| available thing that corners "easy to use", when Tinkercad
| does that admirably.
|
| With a good introduction, you can get into it and really
| work on your own designs in a tool nobody can take away
| from you or nickel-and-dime out of your hands by varying
| the free offer. You can run it on all of your own hardware
| forever. And you will actually learn core things about CAD.
|
| The community is good. There's an absolutely amazing number
| of good free tutorials now; the problem of bad tutorial
| material is a receding issue. I have not seen anything for
| Fusion 360 that even comes close to being as transparent,
| up-front, broadly educational, clickbait-free and
| informative as the Mango Jelly Solutions tutorials for
| FreeCAD.
|
| I do consider it a lifestyle choice, still. But then so
| many creative things are open-ended, freely
| available/documented challenges, rather than easy. Many
| rich experiences do not have an easy entry point with early
| success.
|
| I am a mostly very happy FreeCAD user. It is something that
| costs me no money but has allowed me to make tools unique
| to me that have changed my creative life forever.
|
| All the same I'm about to pick up the Solidworks for Makers
| plan for a year, because I think it's always learning a
| thing from multiple different perspectives. I don't
| particularly expect to be swayed, but I do have future
| plans that involve being a bit more knowledgeable about the
| other packages. Solidworks is where I am going to start.
| hacknewslogin wrote:
| Did you have those challenges after the 1.0 update? I heard
| that update fixed a lot of those issues.
| retrochameleon wrote:
| Workflows and UIs didn't really seem to change much to me,
| so I'd say the UX is still just as poor. I don't doubt
| they've made improvements under the hood and fixed bugs.
| retrochameleon wrote:
| If your priority is to use open-source software, FreeCAD does
| the job. But I basically always recommend AGAINST it for
| anyone who asks me that I consider a more "normal" user.
| Normal in the way that they don't share my masochistic
| tendencies to spend all sorts of time and efforts getting
| open source tools to work, fighting through quirks, poor UX,
| bugs, etc...
| stonemetal12 wrote:
| FreeCAD maybe quite capable, but I am not. I want something I
| can throw a few shapes in and print.
| throw646577 wrote:
| On this basis it's difficult to beat Tinkercad, frankly.
| creaturemachine wrote:
| 123D Design was the golden age for accessible DIY CAD. Of
| course it was too good to be true so AutoDesk killed it
| off.
| throw646577 wrote:
| There was another bubble while Google owned SketchUp, I
| guess. Now no longer so freely available to so many
| people, because they sold it.
| klohto wrote:
| A1 mini is literally 179 USD
| IanCal wrote:
| And excellently usable. I took it out of the box, tightened a
| few things where required and I think that was about it.
| Excellent bit of kit.
| sircastor wrote:
| I'll add my voice to this. I stopped using Fusion360 when they
| adjusted the licensing terms a while back. FreeCAD has a ways
| to go to being at par with the likes of Fusion, but it is a
| capable piece of software - and once you get some hours with it
| you can design really incredible stuff.
|
| Anyone who used Blender in the early days knows how far its
| come. FreeCAD is making that journey too. The 1.0 release is a
| big step. I use FreeCAD for all of my (admittedly amateur) CAD
| work. I've designed toys for my kid, props for my Christmas
| light setup, tool-holders, and any number of things I can't
| think of at the moment.
|
| If anyone is finding FreeCAD hard to pick up, I highly
| recommend Mango Jelly's Youtube channel, which offers lots of
| really great tutorials on using it:
| https://www.youtube.com/@MangoJellySolutions
| hersko wrote:
| +1 for Mango Jelly. He's really fantastic.
| cosmic_cheese wrote:
| I'm only a dabbler in all of this but the thing that really
| grates on me about Fusion 360 is how its performance is awful
| no matter what you're running it on. That might be a boon if
| your machine is very old or low spec, but if you're running
| e.g. a well cooled tower with a Ryzen 5950x and RTX 3080 Ti you
| don't want to be seeing issues with responsiveness, frame
| dropping, etc.
| soneil wrote:
| A bit of a tangent, but on your note amount multi-material being
| wasteful - you can improve that a lot by thinking ahead in your
| design and being strategic about where you use colour.
|
| Your benchy is almost a worst-case scenario (which is likely
| intentional) - because the coloured features are vertical, there
| will be several changes per printed layer. If you can constrain
| your material changes to layer boundaries you'll get a much
| better waste ratio.
|
| A good example of this is printing coloured labels/features on a
| faceplate. So you print the whole faceplate in a single material,
| then switch material and print the highlight colour as raised
| features. That gets you a lot of result for a single material
| change. (On single-material printers there's a method where you
| strategically pause the print and swap the materials by hand.
| Learning lessons from that will really hammer home the mindset of
| optimising tool changes!)
|
| There's a lot of lessons like this you'll pick up, where making
| your design sympathetic to the print process can have huge
| payoffs.
| Ambadassor wrote:
| I agree, designing for 3D printing and more specifically
| designing for multi-color or multi-material can help save a lot
| of time and material.
|
| Additionally, printing any number of copies of the same
| multicolor object will result in the same amount of waste. This
| doesn't reduce the absolute amount of waste, just makes it a
| smaller % of the total material used.
|
| Also worth looking into the "wipe into object" setting in the
| slicer, which will use the color changes in an extra model
| instead of purging them.
| fecal_henge wrote:
| I bought a Stratasys J35 and its just a bucket to dump money
| into... I mean it can print absolutely tiny features but
| maintinance and consumables are so expensive.
|
| Meanwhile my colleague bought a Bambu Carbon for I think 2% of
| the price of my J35 and its such a brilliant machine. Fillament
| printers just seem to be getting better and better.
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| > _[the webcam 's] mount's front-facing part dips too much down
| beyond the bezel, and it ends up blocking my screen._
|
| As an old-school software engineer, I would've been strongly
| tempted to solve this excess material problem with a file.
| fmeyer wrote:
| Nice post, let me build up on the software engineering analogy.
|
| I've had a 3D printer for a while, and I have to say that Bambu
| has completely changed my perspective on the whole experience.
|
| Before, I treated it mostly as a time-consuming hobby - setting
| up my own Octopi for remote printing, tinkering with different
| settings and parts on my Prusa. It was all trial and error, with
| most prints turning out below average.
|
| Now it feels more like a continuous integration system. It runs
| mostly unattended, always ready to execute my next batch of
| prints.
|
| I recently traveled for a week and only needed my wife to refill
| the filament and remove finished prints, allowing my workflow to
| continue uninterrupted.
|
| I don't regret my initial experience since I learned a lot, but I
| really appreciate having a more streamlined process now.
| wdfx wrote:
| > and only needed my wife ... to continue uninterrupted
|
| That's some sweet workflow optimisation. :)
|
| I'd have tons more free time if I just outsource all the little
| tasks that keep me busy to my significant other.
| Ambadassor wrote:
| That has been my experience as well. I had a bunch of printers
| before the X1C, from 3 different countries, and all of them
| needed various amounts of tweaking and hacking to reach the
| print quality and ease-of-use I was expecting.
|
| Even the Prusa MK3 (upgraded to MK3S, then MK3S+...) required a
| Raspberry Pi to be able to print without lugging an SD card
| from my PC to the printer, and a USB webcam to add print
| monitoring.
|
| Now when people ask for FDM printer recommendations, I tell
| them that this hobby has two main paths: One path regards the
| printer as a tool to create things for other projects; the
| other path has the printer as the project itself.
|
| An analogy I use is buying a car that's working and ready to
| drive vs buying a car that doesn't work and repairing it. Are
| you looking to drive or are you looking to fix/build a car?
|
| Bambu printers are an easy recommendation for a printer which
| is a tool. The new Prusa CORE One might be a good fit as well,
| but it's still too early to tell what its quirks are. For
| printers that are projects, the Ender 3 comes to mind as a very
| cheap base for countless tinkering and upgrades.
| throw646577 wrote:
| > Now when people ask for FDM printer recommendations, I tell
| them that this hobby has two main paths: One path regards the
| printer as a tool to create things for other projects; the
| other path has the printer as the project itself.
|
| This is undeniably true at the youtube content level.
|
| But at the printer level I think consumers will crash into
| this far less if buying the latest. Creality's three new
| Ender 3 V3 models are all low-tinkering models, even the
| cheapest. So are the Anycubics. Sovol's latest machines like
| the SV06 Ace manage to be both fully open source and also
| highly tuned out of the box.
|
| As much as I admire the build quality of (most of) the Bambu
| Lab machines, in real terms what they have actually achieved
| is making the closed source, closed build, hard to upgrade
| and repair, RFID-chipped-consumables printer acceptable to
| the market. They even almost succeeded in making printing
| dependent on the cloud, until their little distributed
| industrial accident happened.
| avensec wrote:
| Massive +1 - Bambu changed everything for me. I've been in the
| hobby for 10 years, built multiple Vorons from source & kit,
| and heavily modified multiple Prusa machines (Full Bear).
| Nothing compares to how easy Bambu made everything. My wife,
| who has seen me print for all that time without being able to
| figure it out, can now print items without hassle or oversight
| on the X1C.
|
| Another way I can tell that Bambu changed everything is through
| second-hand market prices. Before Bambu, I could sell most 3D
| printers for not much less than I purchased them or more,
| depending on the mods. I just struggled to sell a Voron 2.4 300
| for $800 (near $1800 build price after extras). There is still
| a market for enthusiast printers, but the leap in user-
| friendliness is known. What they provided for the cost was a
| vast market leap.
| self_awareness wrote:
| Being on a budget and buying X1C with AMS has nothing in common.
| It's a bad choice. It's a really awesome printer that _just
| works_ , but it's not a budget option.
|
| If you're on a budget, buy yourself BambuLab A1M, which is the
| best quality-to-money ratio.
| frickinLasers wrote:
| Did Bambu fix that thing where their printers need to be online
| and waiting for instructions from the cloud to be useful? I'm
| not about to send my designs through their servers.
|
| https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/08/3d-printers-print-br...
| sdflhasjd wrote:
| They fixed it in the sense that there's an opt-in offline-
| only print mode and they do work without a connection. It
| still requires you to do an initial setup using the mobile
| app, so if you're an offline-first kind of person, their
| printers are definitely not for you
| proee wrote:
| When you start designing products with lots of gears and
| linkages, does animating/simulating your design become critical?
| What CAD tools are best for simulating your design, or is this
| even the right way to verify all your mechanical items are
| working together as expected?
| mlsu wrote:
| This is pretty typical. The first step of CAD is learning
| simple solid modeling (i.e. producing 3d parts from sketches,
| features, etc).
|
| The next step is assemblies and motion. Writing a solid
| modeling CAD engine is impressive, but kinematics and
| simulation is really the tough part (and why these CAD
| softwares are so expensive and so worth the money). For
| example, SolidWorks has a separate "motion study" package that
| you pay for on top of the solid modeling tool, a separate
| "fluid simulation package," to calculate stresses, drag, and so
| on on a part. Assemblies are also huge, most CAD programs have
| utilities for creating relations between different parts to
| figure out where screws, clasps, hinges, etc, should go where
| and in what order.
|
| Many professional CAD packages also have things like mold
| tools, sheet metal tools, etc. that make manufacturing much
| much easier. You typically have a drawing tool, to create
| marked up drawings to send off to a machine shop for
| fabrication. Manufacturability is huge and mostly invisible to
| hobbyists who are doing 3-d prints. In general, software that
| makes manufacturing stuff easier, is where CAD packages capture
| the most value from their users. The manufacturing stuff is why
| you might pay $5,000 per year per seat for a CAD suite. It's
| also why they're not too worried about open source CAD, because
| the open source guys don't care, or know enough to care, how to
| add this type of value.
|
| Finally, the big big boys (like CATIA and so on) have utilities
| to track part revisions, quality tracking, assembly and QC
| workflows etc. For when you need to manufacture hundreds of
| thousands of something, test it, have it fail in predictable
| ways, manage spare parts for it, be tracked and regulated etc.
| Those are generally used for stuff like cars and jets which
| have complex supply chains.
| 65 wrote:
| Fusion 360 has an API in C# and Python.
|
| I use the Python API to write 3D modeling scripts for everything
| I 3D model. It takes a little longer to build up your own utility
| function library so you can make models quicker, but once you've
| got a solid utility library of your own, making 3D models with
| code is really easy and fun.
| bschwindHN wrote:
| I recently gave a talk on this topic though it was more focused
| on code-based CAD, and with extra emphasis on Rust because it was
| at a Rust meetup. But very similar vibes overall, I think there
| will be many software engineers picking up CAD and 3D printing in
| the near future.
|
| https://youtu.be/0wn7vUmWQgg
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