ELS Motor mount in shapr3d for C0636 14x40 lathe

[Janger]

I’ve been trying a new to me program shapr3d. It has iPad (!) windows and Mac versions. the iPad version uses the Apple Pencil stylus. It’s pretty amazing. I am quite productive with it already. Below are pictures of the model I’m putting together to mount a servo motor on the end of my lathe lead screw. I am thinking about rocketronics ELS kit. So does this post belong under cad, Cnc, 14x40 lathes, or my projects? Anyway.

The fancy coloured render is a pay for feature (there is a free version with limits but still very useful).
The Colors mean something. Orange is the lead screw flange to 5mm shaft. The yellow is the drive coupler (love joy). The red is the 5mm to 14mm shaft adapter. light grey is the aluminium angle to mount the motor. Gold is the leadshine servo.

shapr3d is $399CAD a year. Free with storage for two designs. And some other limits not sure exactly yet. 2d drawings is one That is missing in the free one.

oh and I downloaded the cad motor model so that modeling is not me.

 

[Janger]

Virtual reality function. you place your model in the live camera mode and can then view it from different angles moving around in the room.

 

[jcdammeyer]

Pretty cool but... I have troubles with subscription software of any sort. $399 per year rather than $399 and after that you have it forever but maintenance and upgrades are $x is fine.

When AlibreCAD/CAM was sold to SD Systems they changed the name to GeomagicCAD and MecSoft created a version called GeomagicCAM. As before, yearly support, but I was worried it would go south so they had, for an extra cost, USB keys that meant you didn't need to be internet connected. If the company went south and stopped online license acknowledgement you would still have running software.

Well the authors of AlibreCAD bought it back from SD systems a few years later but dropped support for AlibreCAM (MecSoft) a short while later and then claimed they were never supporting it after they bought it back. Even now, I had to arrange with MecSoft to have my AlibreCAM license become permanent. If that company ever goes away it's quite possible I'll lose the CAM. And neither of them offer a USB dongle key for their software anymore. On and the online Geomagic support and licenses were dropped.

To make a long story shorter, the free Robot Arm drawings are only STL for 3D printing. Geomagic, being sold by a 3D printing company, did load them. When it became Alibre again they dropped that feature along with the CAM.

I dug out an old ASUS WIN-7 64bit laptop and although I haven't been able to load the driver for GeomagicCAM the CAD dongle was found and installed. And then pulling the installation EXE off the server and running it gave me GeomagicCAD with the ability to load STL files and save them as proper AD_PRT files for Alibre. Much cleaner than the Fusion360 exported STP files.

And that AD_PRT file I can load on my workstation or WIN-10 laptop with Alibre25CAD and Alibre20CAM. All because I had the dongle and not tied to subscription.

The up side of the AD_PRT file is that I get two curves and two straight lines. The import STP file has I think 18 segments to make the same curve and it often ends up with a null pointer error when the CAM tries to create the tool path. The Geomagic to AD_PRT then using AlibreCAM works well. (most of the time)

Moral of the story is if you can get something that is permanently yours you are better off than with the licensing side of things.

 

[Perry]

Virtual reality function. you place your model in the live camera mode and can then view it from different angles moving around in the room.

Time black hole. LOL. I found a couple of the LYNDA learning courses online from our local library. Not sure why but I had to try out the rendering. The shawdows and lighting are the real things that take time to get right. (I only drew the watch.)










Have you tried a CAD program from ANSYS?