What is everyone using for a 3-D CAD program?

Once again, BIG THANKS to the maintainers of CAE!! Other than having to learn Frenglish, the tools have been pretty solid and the setup time, nothing!


I have been trying the FEA tools. So far I have been using models drawn using Solidworks, then importing them. We were doing this to run compares of the two tools. I was very impressed on the results. Then I ran into a small snag....

What are you using for a CAD program?

I would like something that runs under CAE, rather than another OS. 3D is a must. From my own attempts, it seems that the FAE tools have problems with IGES imports but STEP seems to work fine. For me, I can't see learning a script language to do mechanical drawings. Is there such a CAD program out there?

I use Solidworks too, however I moving to Pro/Engineer (the best software for its price). Pro/E was working in Linux (up to version WF 3.0). The Linux version is discontinued, as well as UG NX (last Linux version was 6.0). So there is no good CAD software for Linux.

BRL-CAD is terrible. Better check FreeCAD (not freeCAD), CASCADE or PyCAD (CAD driven by python scripts). But they all are much worse than commercial CAD systems. I am afraid linux user have to wait few years for good CAD 3D software. With 2D is not a big problem, there are already some systems, for example very good DraftSight from DS.

So there is no good CAD software for Linux.

This is what I was finding. I was hoping to be able to use the tools to do some home projects and really can't afford the $11,000 for Solidworks. Some of the FEA benchmark have consisted of around 20,000 nodes and looks very promissing. I tried running some mesh'es in the 600,000 - 800,000 nodes but have not ran a complete analysis with anything this large yet as I started looking at CAD packages.

I tried some of the free and low end Windows packages as well but was not happy with them. I am trying Rhino now which so far I like. Just not sure I want to pay the $1000. I need to go back and try running some more complex models first. Maybe the tools included with CAELinux break.

Bricscad is available for Linux www.bricsys.com/en_INTL/

From what I read, it is comparable to AutoCAD and has a good following among professionals even in the Windows world where there are many other choices.

It is also very affordable.

V.