Are their any good free 3d cad soft wares available ? (maybe trials or something?)

Thank you

Steven

Alibre

I used it to design our Tailwheels.

I've been using a free version of TurboCad 2D for about 10 years now...... Have done about 5 dozen or more designs on in during that time.... : )

Check Ebay for past editions of Turbocad and other softwares. They go really cheap there.

BTW, I was trained as a draftsman on paper. I tried several software packages (have autocad at work even) but TurboCad was the most intuitive for me.

for somone who has never used a CAD program before, (me;-) how hard is it to
design something on it? I know theres a TON of stuff to learn and people go to school
to learn the program, but is it easy enough to figure out to design an airframe or something?

Alibre is a solid modeling 3d Cad program. I had no experience with it before. It has some tutorials that came with it and I was able to produce our tailwheel after about 1 week of playing with it. It even produces 3D pdf files. Check out the attached. Once it opens click on the picture to activate the 3D options.

Originally Posted by HuckinChikn

for somone who has never used a CAD program before, (me;-) how hard is it to
design something on it? I know theres a TON of stuff to learn and people go to school
to learn the program, but is it easy enough to figure out to design an airframe or something?

The program works by designing parts and then assembling them. An airframe may be too much for the free version, I think it limits the parts in an assembly to 30.

cool thanks for the info! i think i'll check it out.

Jared - I use Metasequoia. It's the software that most airplanes are created for AFPD. You draw the airplane in Metasequoia, then add additional metadata to describe flight characteristics, CG, stuff like that. Here's my Extra that I'm building now.

for somone who has never used a CAD program before, (me;-) how hard is it to
design something on it? I know theres a TON of stuff to learn and people go to school
to learn the program, but is it easy enough to figure out to design an airframe or something?

Jared, you really asked two questions..... Designing an airframe and drawing what you've designed are two different things.

I taught myself CAD, but was formally trained in drafting. I think you can teach yourself, especially if you have good spacial ability.

If you do, take the time to learn to use 'snaps', as they are definitely well worth using.

A great way to learn to use CAD is to duplicate some plans or draw an object that already exists. Then, once you are capable drawing something that already exists, you can more easily draw something you'd like to build.

Dave, i like that extra!
Jeremy, cool! I'm definately going to give it a try. I've always wanted to try my hand at
designing a plane the "right" way instead of just drawing the plans out on poster board
like i've done in the past. it works that way, but just takes a long time to draw something
out like that.
hey Jeremy, are you gonna make it to Toledo next weekend? we missed you at the
E-Fest, hope you can make it to ohio!

hey Jeremy, are you gonna make it to Toledo next weekend?

No Toledo for me. I hope ya'll have a great time!

Originally Posted by HuckinChikn

Dave, i like that extra!
Jeremy, cool! I'm definately going to give it a try. I've always wanted to try my hand at
designing a plane the "right" way instead of just drawing the plans out on poster board
like i've done in the past. it works that way, but just takes a long time to draw something
out like that.
hey Jeremy, are you gonna make it to Toledo next weekend? we missed you at the
E-Fest, hope you can make it to ohio!

There are differences between "Designing" a plane and "Documenting" a plane.....

The Documentation, or Drawing merely reflects the design intentions... and gives directions to the builders.....

So, just because it is drawn up pretty in CAD, does not make the design superior.... One can have a great design with a lot of experiance and design intelligence documented on an old paper grocery sack.

There are many benefits to 3D modeling. Several are that it can alert you to interferences between parts... or violation of minimum clearances... (Like Spark Plug Cap to Cowl interior).. it can also track the AC CG if the proper densities are applied to all the components.... also... many systems are parametric.. or rather... say for example, you needed to make the spruce (or carbon) spar cap thicker.... all you should need to do (If modeled smartly) is modify or redefine the cap to be thicker, and all the notches in the ribs (or foam core) and the height of all the shear webs will automatically adjust....

Just for fun, find a city college with a CAD program.... preferrably Pro/E, Solid works, Catia or Unigraphics... a couple nights a week of classes and you should be able to model a RC plane as most parts are simple shapes.... believe it or not, a canopy and an engine cowl can be challenging parts to model!!!

There is a free cad software called Draftsight. It's developed by Dassault Systems. The same people who developed Solidworks. Great software. As good as Autodesk's Autocad. And it's free.

http://www.3ds.com/products-services...ad-draftsight/