Autocad worth it?

[Rossman]

I've been trying to design my new arcade, and while the arcade itself seems to be reasonably easy, the control panel is giving me some nightmares! I'm trying to build a 4 player control panel that doesn't feel crowded. I got autocad to help me design it, but it's so complicated! Everything seems to require 10 steps to do something seemingly simple.

Here's my question: Is autocad the best program to design arcade plans? Are there really good tutorials somewhere? How do I draw things in autocad perfectly to scale?

Any help would be appreciated, and any advance as to which program i should use would be great. Maybe it's time to break out the graph paper and pencil?

[Franco B]

Many people use [SketchUp] for their design work.

AutoCAD is powerful but as you have found out it does have a steep learning curve for a start.

The easiest way to draw things to scale is to use the offset and trim/extend tools.

Ok. Imagine for a start you are drawing your CP viewed from above. The first thing you would want to do is draw a rectangle of the basic size of the CP. Lets pretend its 500mm x 250mm

Draw a vertical line of any length for a start using the line tool.

Make sure you have Ortho turned on by clickling the little button at the bottom of the page. Activating this means you can only draw vertical and horizontal line. Click on two places on the screen, one above the other, on the screen and you should have a straight vertical line.

Now use the offset tool to offset the vertical line you have drawn. Click it and it will ask you what the offset dimension is. Type 500 and press enter. It will then ask you to choose and object to offset so click on the vertical line. It will then ask you to pick a side to offset the line so just click either to the left or the right of the line.

The line will then be copied and placed 500mm to the left or right of the original line. You may need to use the scroll wheel of your mouse to zoom in/out to see it.

You can use the line tool again to join up the bottom of the vertical lines. You will need object snap switched on to do this. You may also need to right click object snap to choose which snap points to use. In this case you will need the end points highlighted. If you have done this correctly when you use the line tool you should see a little anchor mark appear near the ends of the line as your cursor approaches it. This means the line will snap to the ends of the line when you click the mouse.

You now have a horizontal line of exactly 500mm with two vertical lines at the ends. Use the offset tool again but this time enter 250 as the offset dimension. Now select the 500mm horizontal line as the object to offset and click above the line to offset it above the line.

More than likely the vertical lines will not reach the top horizontal line that you just offset. You can use the extend tool to extend the lines to meet the ends of the other line. Click the button and it will ask you to select an object(s) to extend to so click the upper horizontal line and press enter. It will now ask you to select the objects to extend so click the ends of the vertical lines and they should extend to the horizontal line to make a rectangle that is exactly 500mm x 250mm.

Alternatively if, when you offset the horizontal line, the vertical lines extended past the new horizontal line you will need to use the trim tool.

This is used in the same way as the extend tool. You select which line to use as a cutting edge, press enter and then click the parts that pass the cutting edge to remove them.

I know this sounds a little long winded but once you have done it a couple of times you will be able to do it in seconds. You could use the rectangle tool to do this but it would be a polyline and you wouldn't be able to offset parts of it etc

This type of thing is the basis of all drawing all of the basic parts of the drawing and for creating anchor points for drawing circles, chamfers etc etc.

Most of the tools will walk you through them and ask you for information.

If you want anymore help just ask. I am in no way a master of CAD but I use it a little to draw components etc and its what I have always used for my cab design. There may be better ways to draw things but these are the methods I use. I can get some screen shots of the various parts of this mini guide if you would like. I would have done it already but I am at work and I don't have AutoCAD here, I just copied the buttons from google images.

[Rossman]

Wow! Those are some detailed instructions! Thanks a lot!

Now, first question: I have a box, now I want to cut shapes into it, like cut off the sharp edges, or add some curves to it, which tool do I use to edit it? Do I have to change it to a polyline first?

Second, after I'm done creating the top view, is it as simple as switching to 3D view and then extruding the bottom? Are all measurements in mm?

[lcddream]

To curve the edges, you would use Fillet.

Just type F then hit enter
you'll have to enter what radius you want then hit enter
then select the two lines you want to add a radius for

 I'm not familiar with the 3d but I think to extrude your lines may need to be polylines - to change them to polylines when you are ready use
type mpedit then hit enter
in the command line you can see all the options for mpedit - the capital letters are the ones you would use to execute any of them. you want to Join so hit J then enter
select all your lines to join then hit enter
then hit enter one more time to exit the command

[Franco B]

Wow! Those are some detailed instructions! Thanks a lot!

Now, first question: I have a box, now I want to cut shapes into it, like cut off the sharp edges, or add some curves to it, which tool do I use to edit it? Do I have to change it to a polyline first?

Second, after I'm done creating the top view, is it as simple as switching to 3D view and then extruding the bottom? Are all measurements in mm?

Your welcome.

If you have drawn the box by hand as I suggested it will be made of single lines which can be edited. You can use the fillet and chamfer tools as well as using the offset tool to place temporary lines which you can then use to create other profiles (large chamfered corners at degrees other than 90 degrees etc)

Your not far off with the 3d aspect. As lcddream said you do need to turn the shape into a polyline using the PEDIT (not MPEDIT) to join them together. Just make sure that all of the lines meet up as you wont be able to extrude it if you do. When you extrude it will extrude in the Z+ direction unless you select a negative value. When you extrude it you must have the X and Y axis on the same plane as  the profile.

[Rossman]

Fillet doesn't seem to want to work for me. I'm using Autocad 2010 if it makes a difference. When I select the top horizontal line, then the bottom one it gives me a rounded side edge, but if I select one of the side edges, then the bottom one, nothing happens...

Also, is there a way to print it with the measurements displayed without having to draw the measurements in?

[Franco B]

I use AutoCAD 07 as I hate some of the 'upgrades' they gave to the software after that version. I haven't tried 10 but I shouldn't imagine it will really make a difference to what you are trying to do.

I'm not sure why you are having problems with the fillet command. What is the length of the vertical line and what size radius are you trying to draw?

I don't know of a way to display the measurements without using the dimension tools but they only take two seconds to use.

[Blanka]

LOL, I was thinking you wanted to discuss the price of AutoCAD. But I guess you won't BUY it for cab design.
Sketchup is accurate too. I even use it to convert all the new autocadfiles I get from everyone to go-ol 2004. It's accurate enough for that!

Back to the price-discussion
Autodesk is killing Autocad imo. They really have to stop:
- making a new version every year
- charge you 5000$ for the first version
- charge you 1500$ per year on updates
- forbidding resale to others

In the architecture business not everything is cook and egg today (40% lay offs in the Netherlands), and lot of firms go bankrupt, but if you were thinking you could get a cheap Autocad from a bankruptcy sale, dream on. Unlike Adobe, Autodesk does not allow this virtual tools to be resold. Imagine Makita or DeWalt would forbid reselling of there machines!

So what we do now in architecture business, put everyone on Sketchup, and put 4-5 technical drawing makers on autocadLT (the 2D version). That means 5 times less expenses on software a year.
So RIP AutoCAD full architecture edition. We will never buy it again!

[massive88]

If you are starting from scratch knowledge-wise, Id go with Sketch-up.  And if you find a good beginner tutorial, post it here!

I use Autocad daily at work, and it has seriously hindered me in using Sketch-up (I know how to do this in Acad, where is my equivilent button!  Argh!)  Starting from scratch though, might as well go with the better cheaper software.

[Franco B]

I know what you mean massive. I briefly tried Sketch-up once and I couldn't figure it out.

I really should give it more of a go though. I may see if I can install it on a thumb drive and have a play with it some time at work.

You are right though, Sketch-up is probably the best thing to go for if you have little experience with such things. I just thought I would give the OP some pointers if they did want to try AutoCAD.

[lcddream]

As lcddream said you do need to turn the shape into a polyline using the PEDIT (not MPEDIT) to join them together.

Mpedit works too.

[Franco B]

Your right. I thought it must have been a typo as I checked it in 05 and it didn't recognise it. I fired up 09 and it works in that. See, I told you I'm no CAD master 

[djfunkshun]

Don't want to play big bucks for autocad? then try solidworks. They use it at the sign company I work for.
http://www.solidworks.com/