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Date: Mon, 11 Apr 2005 01:18:38 -0600
To: "Rotary motors in aircraft" <flyrotary@lancaironline.net>
From: "BillDube@killacycle.com" <billdube@killacycle.com>
Subject: Re: [FlyRotary] CAD instruction ...
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At 10:58 PM 4/10/2005, you wrote:
>All,
>On somebody's recommendation I bought TurboCad last month.  I assumed 
>there would be some sort of tutorial or something.  Evidently not.  The 
>local Tech school has a course I could enroll in but they use AutoCad 
>(8).  Are the packages similar enough that I could learn the basics in 
>this course and proceed from there?

         I think that enough folks on this list are interested in CAD 
generally that this is worth an on-line response.

         There are "solid modeling" type CAD programs and 2-D type CAD 
programs. Unless you are doing wiring diagrams, PCB layout, or need to work 
with legacy drawings, solid modeling is probably what you want for aircraft 
design.

         AutoDesk AutoCad is a 2-D program that has 3-D abilities. AutoDesk 
Inventor is a solid modeling program and is complete departure from 
AutoCad. They have virtually nothing in common. (They have so little in 
common that AutoDesk provides a copy of Mechanical Desktop (top of the line 
AutoCad) with each copy of Inventor so you can still do something with your 
old drawings.)

         I know AutoCAD very well and it was not any help when I moved over 
to Inventor. It is that different.

         Your main choices for solid modeling are SolidWorks, Inventor, and 
ProEngineer. There are others, but they are less popular than these main 
three. If you are a student, you can get a very sweet deal on these. So 
much so that it you would save money by enrolling in your local community 
college just to get the discount on the software.

         If you are comfortable with computers, it is likely that you will 
be able to learn to use one of the solid modeler programs from the 
tutorials that come with the program. It is faster to take a short course, 
however. It will take a several weeks of study to learn it on your own.

         I should add that one of my favorite parts of Inventor is the 
"sheet metal" modeler. It is astounding. You tell it the type of metal and 
the thickness and it figures out exactly how it will stretch when it bends. 
I have made really complicated sheet metal designs and they come out 
perfectly. You can even drill the holes before you bend the sheet and they 
will all line up. I just print out the unfolded sheet on the plotter, stick 
it to the sheet with double-sided tape, then cut, drill, and bend on the 
dotted lines.

         If you buy ANSYS DesignSpace, you have a direct link from the 
solid model that you draw in Inventor to the ANSYS finite element analysis. 
Just click on the ANSYS icon in Inventor and your model is in ANSYS ready 
for structural, thermal, magnetic, or electrical analysis. You can even add 
in computational fluid dynamics if you need that (for a price.)


Bill Dube <LED@Killacycle.com>
http://www.killacycle.com/Lights.htm