Planning your woodwork

[chiba]

Sketchup is a wonderful bit of software - the learning curve's relatively unintimidating and it's not the straight-jacket that most drawing programs are.

On the other hand, a nice pad of plain paper and a pencil is what I use for sketching. Somewhat geekily I like wooden pencils, because sharpening them with a knife is the kind of mindless activity that gives the inspiration particles most chance of hitting my tiny wee brain (with all due respect to Terry Pratchett).

 

[Sgian Dubh]

Roger, proper planning of projects through sketching and working drawings is your statement of intent-- the route you intend to follow. Diversions that have to be made are made due to unforseen circumstances.

As in route planning, if you don't know where you're journey begins-A, and you have no clear idea of where you're going to- B, how do you know which roads to follow to get from A to B? Slainte.

 

[Martin]

For me it depends on what I'm building, for what purpose etc. If it's a peice that's relatively straightforward and built for purpose (e.g. workshop cabinet) then I just play it by ear and see what I end up with.

However, for "proper work" (that'll end up in the house, given away as presents etc.) I do like to plan abit beforehand. This is more to do with assessing the design and asthetics, but it also helps in understanding where the gotchas will be when I build it.

I use a CAD package (TurboCAD) in order to visualise it in 3D. However, as others have said, the learning curve is rather steep, and I do lose abit of time "learning up" again every time I go back to it.

I do find it invaluable for turning work though - I'm abit of a novice turner, and don't have enough experience of turning to be able visualise what a peice will look like, what's going to be good proportion and not. I therefore tend to render them in CAD first which helps (and also gives me a 2d profile to work to).

The profile is drawn in 2D, and then revolved into a 3D object in TurboCAD which can then be rendered. For example...

 

[Anonymous]

I would definitely suppoort TurboCAD as a good, cheap, CAD package. I have used professional packages costing many tens of thousands for years and find that I can do 80% or more of the same things in TurboCAD for a few tens of pounds!

 

[ijam]

(anyone know where I can get coloured chalk from by the way)

Toyshops, especially those for young kids - maybe like these:
http://www.toysrus.co.uk/Product.aspx/T ... ref=Search

ciao

Ian

 

[tim]

Aaah - space chalk - of course :shock: :shock:

Thanks Ian - I shall try to overcome my fear and enter a Toys R us at some point soon.


Tony - unless I'm much mistaken Turbocad is a little bit more than tens of pounds £490 odd at the Turbocad site - which is a lot more than Sketchup. I know Autocad etc are thousands but its still a fair amount of cash.


T

 

[Anonymous]

I'm firmly in the 'Plans? What plans?' camp other than for home renovations, although I have been known to draw a concept sketch from time to time. Actually, most of my sketches were done after the build so I have a record of what I built! In reality most of the things I build are small and other than a few tricky joints quite simple ( a box is a box isn't it?) so much of what I do is in my head and I fit the design to the material at hand. For example, if the nice offcut is only 15cm long and I was planning a 17 cm box, I make a 15 cm box instead. I can always make a 17cm box another time...

For serious home renovations I use Autosketch. I have version 2 and version 8. Version 8 is complex and has lots of bells and whistles. Version 2 comes on floppy disks and is really easy to use. You can guess which one I use.

 

[DaveL]

Tony - unless I'm much mistaken Turbocad is a little bit more than tens of pounds £490 odd at the Turbocad site - which is a lot more than Sketchup.

Tim,

I have just bought Turbocad v9 from Serif Select for ~£20.
One off the current release, I have loaded it but not drawn any thing yet. Need to look for the safety line and chalk dust. :wink:

 

[Martin]

Tim,

You were also looking at the professional version, which you wouldn't need. Much of the functionality (including 3D modelling) is included in the standard/deluxe version, which can be picked up for about £60 in the shops. I actually looked at Sketchup previously and thought it was rather expensive for what it was (but I must confess I haven't used it).

Martin.

 

[Martin]

...but having said, I've just had a peek at the Sketch-up web site again and it does look impressive.....However, I'd be hard pushed to justify £300 or so...

Martin.

 

[Anonymous]

Aaah - space chalk - of course :shock: :shock:

Thanks Ian - I shall try to overcome my fear and enter a Toys R us at some point soon.


Tony - unless I'm much mistaken Turbocad is a little bit more than tens of pounds £490 odd at the Turbocad site - which is a lot more than Sketchup. I know Autocad etc are thousands but its still a fair amount of cash.

Last copy I purchased was about £60 a couple of years ago and was mightily impressed

I have never used Sketchup but know people who find it too limiting for woodwork - and it costs several times the cost of TurboCAD

Just saw that Dave got it for £20 from Serif - I buy a lot of softweare from Serif and highly recommend thier Desktop publishing package 9v10)

 

[RogerS]

DaveL - I'm thinking of joining SerifSelect and I notice that if I am referred by a 'friend' then said friend (ie you :wink: ) gets a free gift. Your post alerted me to this company so......Just need your membership number if you want would like to do this.

or you can PM me.

Cheers

Roger

 

[beech1948]

Tony,

TurboCAD pro or Delux are indeed £450+. Hoever, a quick look on Amazon.co.uk for turboCAD threw up TurboCAD Standard at £55.69. Any help?

 

[Anonymous]

I use Turbo Cad v10 and its very good. I dont use it in 3d mode though , just for plan, side elevation etc drawings.

I tried a few and this one suits me the best and im still learning everytime i use it because there is so much to it but find that if i just use what i need im fine.

I think i got mine from Amazon for about £60

Jase
Coggy

 

[RogerS]

Many thanks to you all for the suggestions. For my part, I'll probably stick to sketching it out on a piece of graph paper and then visualising all the joints in my head...then measure as we go.