design software for woodwork

[knifeinthesink]

Do any of the avid woodworkers here know a good cad program for laying out projects. I want to avoid extremely steep learning curves, so I think autocad is out.

[TacoD]

maybe google sketch up?

[MuaDibb]

Try a search for free woodworking cut list software, most cost money, some are free or have trial versions. Good luck.

[ThomasW]

http://www.users.bigpond.com/bcolliso/freesoft.htm

[Bent]

cutlist plus is one that has a free trial period.
'seems to be pretty good. you enter all your panel sizes, and it draws out a layout per sheet.

[cjd]

pencil, paper, and a brain.

once you get going, a story-pole or similar.

The best planning does nothing to adapt but feed feelings of inadequacy. The best work is always in the process, not in the plan.

C

[---k---]

I have to agree with Chris. I know (or used to know) Autocad very well. But, I prefer to just sketch. There is something about sketching that teaches you how to think and come up with new ways of doing things, that just dumping the data into the computer will never give you. That was probably one of the first lessons I learned as a young structural engineer.

[JonP]

I do agree with the above, that the less between the brain and the subject at hand, the better for the creative process.

That said, being somewhat lazy by nature, :roll: a few calculating tools can be handy to save some work, as well as cut down on chances for errors to be made.

Cutlist was mentioned, I've got the demo and hardly used it. Looks very powerful to make true cut lists... but it's simple enough to do on paper that I've not bothered to learn it. A pro woodworker, say redoing a kitchen, needs something like that a whole lot more than we do.

I find BoxyCad (PJ's site: BoxyCad ) a useful tool, in that it's easy to play with dimensions, volume changes and visualize the results. That gets me started, then I draw up working plans...

[noah katz]

Does anyone know if there's a cut list package that handles odd-shaped (trapezoisal etc) panels?

Thanks

[Dennis H]

Does anyone know if there's a cut list package that handles odd-shaped (trapezoisal etc) panels?

Thanks

I'm sure such a thing exists (you can do it with AutoCAD add-ons) but those packages tend to be a lot more work than doing it with a pencil and paper. They're fine if you're building 10,000 speakers and want linked CAD files for the whole project but they're not worth it for 2 or 3 speakers. I have AutoCAD and use it for designing houses but I use a pencil and paper (a napkin would do) for speakers. Like Thomas said, I can build a speaker out of wood about as fast as I can build a 3-D computer model of one.

[Rolex]

cjd said it best. Pencil, paper and brain. I am an avid wood worker and know autocad quite well. I do not use it for wood working though. Panel layout is really quite straightforward once you have done it more than one time.

[knifeinthesink]

thanks all.

I agree with Chris and others on the merits of paper, but there are things that the computer offers that I cant do manually, such as modelling, or moving a 3d object to get a sense of proportion, etc.

I tried sketchup, and at first I was interested but it was too frustrating in the end.

Ill look at some of the other suggestions.

[cjd]

Build a model then. In fact, there's a nifty article on the subject in the latest Fine Woodworking.

Computers for modeling are useful when you start needing to go production on something (which technically some of the designs we publish here are), but for one-off projects it's often not worth the time and energy.

C

[knifeinthesink]

Ill look that article up.

[noah katz]

"I'm sure such a thing exists (you can do it with AutoCAD add-ons) but those packages tend to be a lot more work than doing it with a pencil and paper."

Not sure we're talking about the same thing.

I find it very tedious cutting all the pieces of paper out with scissors and moving them around and around. Tedium is just what s/w is good at handling, but if the packages out there are too much work, then they're not very good.

[Dennis H]

I find it very tedious cutting all the pieces of paper out with scissors and moving them around and around.

I don't know anyone who does that. Most of us just sketch the box with the 3 basic dimensions on a napkin and start cutting wood. Of course, being able to do arithmetic in your head helps with that approach.