Darn I’ve tried FreeCAD over several years and every time it was a waste of time. But suddenly now version one comes out and it’s beautiful!!

And stable!!!

I’m cancelling my Solidworks maker subscription.

With Solidworks, you sit around waiting forever for it to load, they update the software constantly so when you want to use it, it’s not ready to be used, and they put you in a stupid online system that is broken half the time and it has features that you can’t possibly understand as they designed it for people in aerospace engineering.

This is part of the open source PUMA microscope project. The CNC stage is still in the early development phase so you won't find it on the GitHub just yet.

For those who want to follow the development of this module, I make regular posts over on my Patreon site here: https://www.patreon.com/c/PUMAMicroscope

If you are not familiar with the PUMA microscope project, the YouTube channel is a good place to start: https://youtube.com/@PUMAMicroscope

I have designed a window in Freecad that was designed off the center point of the sketch. It had 7 Grids wide and 7 Grids tall. I found out that this made the window too tall and reduced it to 5 Grids vertically. Trouble is now the sketch is not centered and the height dimension has been changed. If I try to center this using symmetry it skews messes up the dependent constraints that are located off the primary exterior shape. Is there a way to select all items in a sketch and have it recenter while keeping the dependent constraints locked relatively to the outside shape?

I tried the standard CAD procedure of one File one component in my latest project. Then in the Assembly File, Every object is Linked in the tree view. Know I wanted to share the project with my friends, but it says reference lost.

I know there is the one File multi Body approach, sharing is easy through this Methode.

Is there something like a Pack and go option, like in solidworks that saves the file in a way that a different computer can open the file without any problem ?

Hello everyone.

I'm new to FreeCAD so sorry if this is a simple question (haven't made anything yet) but I couldn't find a good answer / make this work on my own yet.

Basically I'm trying to add threading to the inside of these holes but I can't even fill them (with "Pad"?) to use the "Hole" tool to add them in because I get "Cannot use selected object. Selected object must belong to the active body, Consider using a ShapeBinder or a BaseFeature to reference external geometry in a body." error.

Can anyone help me with this?

The models are available here in case you want to see them yourself:

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/353370/view/3931035846865618326

Thank you.

I'm still pretty new to freecad and am still learning how to do things. I am now adding some simple decorations to a project that I'm making (with the goal of 3d printing). For the current stage, I am putting a meteor and a couple stars on the side of a cylinder. I've basically got it via the curves work bench. The issue is that I'd like to have the meteor have have a an extruded core, then a gap, then extruded fire pattern.

With a regular sketch, this would be trivial. You have the sketch that looks like the below, then you select parts of it to pad (the part with the red xs is the part I don't want to pad):

However, apparently curve work bench sketches don't interact with the part work benches pad tool, and you have to pad them by setting properties of the sketch on surface? And when I do that, it doesn't do what I want, instead extruding the whole shape

(I'm not sure why it mirrored direction either, but I don't really care - I've already adjusted for that.) Any Ideas? I also tried removing the inner most circle, in the hopes that the pad thing would leave a hole, and I could just add a cylinder back in the middle with a separate sketch, but no luck.

EDIT: When carbon copying the sketch onto another portion of the cylinder without the inner circle in the sketch, the pad process did leave a hole - but only in the new places. The original location has the hole filled in. If I can figure that out (any ideas?), I'm currently going back to the plan of "leave a hole and fill it with another sketch on surface later" - but if anyone has a better idea, I'd love to hear it. Based on how long it takes for the project to update after I modify it, I have to guess that I'm not doing things in the freecad way.

Here's the file

Its originally an stl file that I turn into step file with

Create object from mesh > convert to solid > refine shape.

Hello! I am a new Freecad user.

I am having a lot of trouble finding which freecad tutorials fit best for beginners who know absolutely nothing about the programme. I started using ArcSite first, the interface is more friendly and easier to understand but I didn't want to pay the premium so I'm looking at other programmes.

I have been having some issues with importing my dxf files from ArcSite over to Freecad.. but I also realized that my mastery of the software is quite poor.

Can anyone recommend any tutorials for Freecad that can explain the software to me like I'm 5?

Thank you soooo much!

Edit: Thanks everyone!!! <3

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New to Freecad. I’m familiar with parametric modeling, but I’d like to find resources for CNC toolpaths for wood window components. YouTube tutorials I’ve found are 2D cuts, but I need to understand more advanced 3D cuts - designing the 3D toolpath as well as CNC setup. I’d like to also find G-code tutorials.

Hi everyone,
I’m trying to arrange multiple keyboard switch holder bodies into a strip in FreeCAD and connect them smoothly. Here's what I’ve done so far:

1. I’ve modeled a switch holder body in PartDesign.
2. I used Draft → Clone to make three copies and positioned them in a line.
3. I turned the clones into solids with Part → Create Simple Copy.
4. I fused them into one solid using Part → Boolean → Union.

Now I want to connect these bodies with a smooth transition, but when I try to use Part → Loft between the faces, I get the error:

"At least two vertices, edges, wires, or faces are required".

My Question:

How can I connect these bodies into a smooth strip? Is lofting the right approach, or is there a better method to achieve a continuous, 3d printable solid?

Thanks for your help!

I'm following a tutorial fcb lounge-2 m x 2 m room. I wrote down every move. "click means push and release" for constraint "push and release shift"

my biggest issue was that I had to use end line snap and I could not get the "y" axis dialog to stay active so that I could tab tab to enter the length then press enter and hope for the best.

I obviously did not write all of the directions just for that step here.

I feel I have a win of the day here. btw I did the construction square and offset just fine.

I keep trying freeCAD every once in a while because I want to switch, but keep finding that there are many frustrations.

I feel like my main issue is that I don't know how to interate on my designs.

How do you all do that? Are there good tutorials for that?

For me, I'm used to Fusion. I know I shouldn't expect them to work the same, but at its core my workflow there is:

• Create a rough design. Usually 1 to 3 sketches.
  
• Any dimensions are parameters set to an approximate value. The plan is to change them all later. I start knowing my measurements are "wrong" and the whole project needs to work even if these numbers change later - because they will.
• Create rough object(s) from those sketches as proof of concept.
• Iterate on the concept as needed (example: maybe adding more holes or adjusting where parts attached, etc)
• Then measure everything down to an exact figure and update the parameters, which updates all the sketches/objects
• Repair any timeline issues.
• Fillets or other final touches
• Done.
• ....ok actually that one measurement was wrong, so adjust, re-save. Done for real now.

Is there a workflow similar to this in FreeCAD where you start out making everything parametric, and get the whole way to a proof of concept knowing that you'll be making final adjustments later?

Or is this maybe one of those "that's not how FreeCAD works situations?

I used FreeCad a while back to make a simple stand. Used good modeling practices as per the wiki.

Simple model, too. ( Like 1 extrusion, 1 pocket and a few rounds and chamfers)

Exported in ALL files which are usually used for exporting to other systems.

None worked for the machinery using SOLIDWORKS.

Any idea why?

Latest version on windows.

As the title says, I need help on how to profile this area encircled in red.

Tried moving the sweeps into the active body but it still remains outside active body and a blade is now missing.

(It's the silver spoon thing) 😭😭😭 what even is this geometry... 🤮🤮 If anyone has some tips, they would be very much appreciated!

Hey,

I cant extrude my sketch in the part designer. I get the error message: "wire is not closed.". However I used the new constraint coincident tool and it is still not working.

What am I doing wrong?

Hey friends,

i'm really struggling to do something that i think is super simple, and can't find any documentation to follow on how to do it. I'm just trying to create a flat surface that i can punch some holes into and attach some posts. I did something like this like 4 years ago in FreeCAD, but now i cannot for the life of me recall how to do it.

Thanks in advance.

Very simple object (I think). Sketch a slot 10mm between centers, 0 degrees, 2.5mm radius.

Pad 3mm with -10 degree angle.

This object as described passed the geometry check.

Now in the Part Design workbench use Thickness with a thickness value of 0.5mm and unselect inside thickness. This will not work. You have to change the 'join type' from 'arc' to 'intersection', then it works, however you get the shape above which has geometry faults a-plenty.

Any thoughts on how to make this shape without geometry problems? If I extrude a rectangle with an angle that's great, but I can't get rounded ends in a proper way (that I have found) because of the angles.

In this model, I tried to use the Fillet tool in PartDesign which simply would not work. I thought to try applying the fillets using Part WB on a simple copy, which worked great! So I wondered if I could get it to work on the Body from PartDesign. Yes, it did.

Crazy thing is... I went back to PartDesign to recreate the problem from yesterday for this post, and now it's working fine in PartDesign. I have no idea what to think about this.

What's different today? Well, I installed the Telemetry addon which required additional supporting application installs. And I installed the Curves WB Addon. I don't know if that's relevant or just a coincidence.