I’m trying to get the hang of Fusion 360 - don’t get me wrong, I like the CAM features it has, but modelling wise, everything seems so difficult compared to Solidworks…
I feel like I might be doing something wrong, but simple things seem a little more convoluted than they are in Solidworks - things like making matching holes in an assembly.
I’ve also noticed DXF files export really really badly, and sometimes, if I import a dxf it won’t recognise a hole as a hole.
Am I doing something wrong?
I have no idea. I feel the same as you do. There is one setting in there though that actually says “solidworks style” I think it is for how the mouse works or the screen rotates. That really helped me get a little further along. I can do things in a few minutes in solidworks and I have no idea how to even start in fusion. I always have to look things up.
Onshape is/was identical to solidworks but I think they changed the business model and how they charge for use.
On shape is free if you don’t mind everything being public. I haven’t ever used it for work though. Solidarity is super expensive though, isn’t it?
Yes, yes it is… :lol:
sigh stupid Autocorrect. SOLID WORKS*
Solidworks is sold only through re-sellers which makes it so much worse. They are like car salesman with your phone number and email, they never stop even after you give them your money. “Hey renew 8 months early and get a deal!”…on a 12 month package. A friend of mine was able to work a 2 for cheaper deal and sometimes they will dip really low to get you to buy it thinking you will give them $1200 a year for the new updates. You don’t have to. I know people that still use there free student edition we got in school for personal projects. I can’t imagine a feature they could introduce to make me want to pay again. The last feature I remember wishing I had was there new slotting tool, but that really only save me from having to draw two extra lines. I am sure at some point I will have to suck it up and learn fusion better but for now. Keep on with the old license.
Or…go completely open source and just switch to onshape, no learning curve required, no extra money.
Yup, I went a year in uni doing an electrical engineering degree (Took me 6 months from being a licensed electrician to realise it wasn’t great) and the best thing that came out of it was learning to use solid works…and a the student licensed version of solidworks.
Hello,
if you like a Solid Works / Catia like workflow have a look at Alibre Design.
It is far from free but still reasonably priced.
(I think it is in the 300 - 400 Euro range at the moment )
Christian
Nice a new option I hadn’t heard of. Works out to about half price of solidworks.
SolidWorks and onshape now have “Configurations”, which Fusion 360 does not have yet.
Should also add that my assemblies are constantly crushing Fusion 360.
I can’t help but think Fusion 360 runs badly on my computer because it’s cloud based…I don’t know if that’s because and getting old and the techno-fear is setting in, but I don’t really see the point in having a program like 360 cloud based
I would think the processing is happening client side (on your computer). That’s not as efficient as code optimized for your machine, but I doubt the difference is significant.
I’m guessing that the benefits of it being cloud based are: 1) Autodesk has a better grasp on licencing and 2) no one is running out of date software, which simplifies support. Both of which allow them to offer it for free for hobbyists, for now. AutoCAD used to be the guy that was crazy expensive and hard to use… Like solid works.
I used to love Pro/e because of how hard the stone aged autocad was and we made fun of solidworks for being basic…
I almost quit school in my first few semester to teach pro/e on the side at night, glad that professor didn’t persuade me too hard. Community college was full of headhunters, the next CAD professor I had tried to convince me to go work for a box/display design company.
I wonder how much they got per recommendation/life they destroyed. Destroyed is probably a strong word, but it definitely seems shady.
I was flattered at the time, once I transferred out of the JC I was a little pissed when I realized they must be getting commission.
Wasn’t using Artioscad was it? It’s solidworks based.
Not sure, I got that offer after I was accepted into SDSU. At that point there was no quitting/turning back in my mind.
I look at the Autodesk vs Solidworks debate like the iPhone vs Android… It all depends on what you start with.
True. I did finally make the other big switch, from illustrator to inkscape. It was easy though because I am not a “power user”, I can stumble around gimp but have pretty much tried to stick with vector anyway, so that could be the problem there.
So I guess for me surfaces or assembles with mechanical mates gets you to “power user” territory in CAD and when changing gets complicated.
I started with iPhone. Android is measurably better. [ducks]