Free CAD

[Retired]

Hi,

This CAD is getting serious; I was fully awake during the night around 3 o'clock thinking about how to add a snap ring groove to the drawing I've already produced for my clutch mounting which has been evading me. I'll kick it around a bit more today and post my result later. Once I reach the stage of being awake during the night thinking of problems I know I'll eventually succeed as such projects gain a fierce hold on me.

Your home made radio back panels could easily be mistaken as manufacturers panels David as they are the business with the labels help from Tony adding to their authenticity, very well done and others can follow your lead as you describe the process in great detail in other posts. You've mastered making router jigs and it shows by the perfect spacing of all the slots which would be virtually impossible to reproduce by freehand routing.

I too would fully encourage you to submit the article for inclusion in the BVWS Bulletin; Carl the editor is always on the look out for interesting stories/articles and the information would be of great help to readers wishing to make back panels but who don't really know how to go about it.

Could I be cheeky David and I know it involves extra time and work but I believe extending the article to cover your excellent router jig "comb/finger jointing" would also be most interesting and useful. The comb joints produced in using the jig are extremely precise and look very attractive; as you know David I've also produced these joints from the information you kindly sent me.

I know you are deeply into 2D Coral Draw Gary as you turn out some wonderful drawings but I do wonder if Coral Draw 3D would be like many other such drawing programs and would put you off by their complexity. It was such complex drawing programs that caused me to despair for so many years of ever producing a 2D drawing let alone a 3D drawing. You though persevered with Coral and cracked 2D so I do sincerely wish you the very best of luck if you try and if you do could I please ask you to post your progress. I openly admit I was unable to use such drawing programs so would follow your progress with great interest. You can of course keep me updated with progress via email as I enjoy receiving your work in progress stories even if the electronic detail is way beyond me.

Thanks Lawrence; yes at last I'm grasping CAD basics and finding it most rewarding on a personal level; once I buy my new computer then I'll know it is down to me if I have problems and not down to software or drivers/graphic cards or whatever.

Many thanks Joe for the information. I'm going to be cheeky as I'll send you the drawing via email then you will be able to play around with it and hopefully then explain if you succeed in how you did it because I am unable to move the 3D image at all on my computer; the options are shown for saving/copying/pasting and I am unable to print even using "print screen" the image sits on the screen laughing at me. perhaps this is down to my on board graphics as I do receive a message saying my computer is not set up to handle this type of file. I've spent hours during the week as discussed on my thread seen here;

http://golbornevintageradio.org/forum/sh...p?tid=2794

I hope you can add the required link onto this thread Joe because it is truly amazing to view 3D for the first time and if I can produce such work given my previous failings with CAD then I believe anyone can.

Kind regards, Col.