I created a Body, then a sketch on the XY plane, drew two circles of 100 and 90 mm radius and the same center point to form the outer ring of the model and in Tasks clicked 'Pad' of 10 mm length. On my Win10 desktop I downloaded, unpacked and started the portable FreeCAD version 0.18.Īfter reading and watching a few tutorials I started my project, using at first 'Part design' workbench. I started looking for a software where I could create a 3D model of this picture, export to STL, and using Ultimaker CURA slice it to gcode.

It is just a ring with inside what looks like a H letter and again the same but upside down. Yesterday my wife asked me to print a 3D model of the logotype of her company, see attached picture. We’re an Amazon Associate and earn a small fee from qualifying purchases.Last week I bought a Creality Ender 3 V2 printer. That’s where FreeCAD could help out a great deal: it’s sufficiently powerful to produce relatively complex objects, and is available at no charge.īut you may need a book to help get you started on FreeCAD, and this book could be the one. These folks will soon tire of printing other people’s 3D models and want to do their own, but they will be shocked by the pricing of some commercial 3D tools. I’m thinking that as the capabilities of desktop 3D printers continues to increase, we will see more people coming into the technology for the first time. At the end of sections there are questions and exercises to firm up your FreeCAD skills.

The remainder of the book explores more advanced techniques, such as generating patterns of objects, creating formal drawings, solid modifications and assemblies, which are designs containing multiple parts.Įach section of the book is laid out in tutorial fashion, with specific examples being explored for each concept. Then you’ll learn how to “dress up” the solids with features such as threaded holes, pockets, etc. The next section of the book deals with how to transform those sketches into 3D solid objects through a variety of techniques included with FreeCAD. Sketching is more complex than one might imagine, but there are plenty of examples of how to create all manner of sketches here.

The book then moves on to sketching, a critical function that is used to create curves that are later extruded into 3D shapes.

Freecad to 3d printer