Making your own race parts

Ain't that the truth. 3 years into CATIA and I've barely scratched the surface.

 

I think all of the softwares have their advantages and disadvantages. Whichever people learn on is usually their prefered.
I have use catia, solidworks and creo.

My favorite is Creo and it is what i currently use at work.
Sw interface looks more modern than the rest, and maybe slightly friendlier.
Catia i saw used alot in the automotive field.

 

Catia is also really big in aerospace, which is why almost all my experience is catia. I am a big fan of how solidworks looks, and because of the price I would definitely use it if I started my own company making parts. A seat of the catia license I use at work is in the $30,000 to $50,000 a person per year I believe. Some of the additional licenses we don't have but would be super usefull, however they cost an insane amount for how much we would actually utilize them

 

Well if there is anything in particular you're trying to do let me know! I have tons of experience with the solid, assembly, generative surface design, and cpd (the composites workbench)

 

I'm a daily Solidworks user, I don't have much experience with other systems, I think it just comes down to whatever you were trained on and know how to use. They all get the job done and they all make you want to punch the computer screen sometimes.

 

So goddamn true it hurts....

My favorite catia error is "cannot offset due to smooth edges that are weakly sharp"...

Eventually figured it out, but what kinda error is that??

 

Please to put slot A in the most Honorable tab B. For the money, SW is a good value for its capability. Training costs and time to proficiency, is also a major factor. Catia and ProE just don't make sense to me for that reason.

 

SolidWorks FTW!

 

Creo has lifted a lot of functionality from SW it's seems. We use multiple versions of each depending on what our customer wants us to use (consulting business) so it's not uncommon to use Creo and then Creo 3 one day and the next day move to a project that uses Solidworks 2015. Usually not a big problem, but the lack of backwards compatibility has bitten me a few times.

I'm intrigued by the composites module in CATIA, first I've heard of it but I pretty much only deal with machined components and some injection molding.

 

Backwards compatibility....does that even exist anymore? Programs used to provide that, but now they force you to upgrade no matter what. I don't like updating to the latest version of SW until they're at SP2 or greater, but if I have a customer that already jumped to the next version, it forces me to follow suit.

 

Have any of you used NX? We're an NX house at work and it's pretty powerful. It uses a part tree and ability to link parts like Catia while being relatively user friendly like SW.

 

SPEEDHOLES !

 

Took a break from my spring break, went to the machine shop, and turned some drawings into doo-dads for the electric racing team

 

It lets you input materials, set ply boundaries, and run simulations on how well the plies will fit in. Also makes solids from the plies you describe, and lets you export flat patterns. Like all software however it isn't perfect, and the ply producibility simulations need a grain of salt sometimes.

Most of my work is in the composites workbench and gsd (generative shape design) workbench

 

Crap I need to call you over the weekend about the internship. I'm actually in town for a couple weeks so will actually have some time.

 

Sidebar - some software error messages are hilariously obtuse.

One of my favs was "mask 0 not in footprint".

 

Sweet, call anytime...except during the Daytona 200 hahah

 

They used to make us draw that stuff with pencils and shit.

 

I'll be watching it at little league.

 

Those of us that can't express ideas electronically are forced to...