Drafting Type Program?

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It's Qcad that I am using. It was recommended in post 3 and between the youtube videos and the searchable online e-manual I've made it this far which amazes me :)

There is a dimension box. That is where I went to change the size of the font. I also tried going there to see if I could change it so it would only display inches (144 inches not 12 feet) but I struck out there. Could it be that if I change the type (architectural, decimal, engineering / scientific) it might also change that? I'm not sure I can change the type but I'll check that out tonight.

You were safe to assume that I am not doing layers. I understand the concept but not how to make them all work together. I read I can toggle each layer so I can see it or not see it but I'm not how they work together. Like for printing, will it only print what I am viewing on the screen?

Speaking of backgrounds one thing that is kicking my butt is when I go to print preview it changes the background to white and the lines to black. That's fine but I haven't been able to figure out how to change it back like in the snips I've been attaching. I also see if I can figure out how to change it to white because that just makes sense.

Thanks,
-Bob
 
take yuor time with it.. one thing at a time!

I remember a boss's boss saying: "why is the team slow? didn't we just upgrade the CAD software?"

to which he replied: " yeah, but we need time to figure out where they put everything.." (meaning things got moved around. alot! I think it was from ACAD 11 or 12 to 13, a big jump with a 'windows style' pull down menus! We saw another similar 'slow down' when Windows introduced "the ribbon"..
 
FWIW - If you ever get to the point of wanting to do this in 3D, TinkerCAD could be a decent solution since it is really intuitive and easy to use.

You can create cylinders and ogive nose cones and flat objects like fins. If all you are doing is creating elements to check outer dimensions or look of a rocket, it is pretty fast. The most fiddly thing about it is making fins which I have found I make by creating flat cuboid objects (usually 2mm thick) and cutting out corners using multiple triangular prism cut-outs.

It does not do the dimension marks (as far as I know) like you are now so is not really designed for printing plans but can be a good-enough application if you want to see your rocket in 3D.

1634901617838.png
 
I'm late to this thread, but I'll add that I'm a big fan of Adobe Illustrator. Not only can it be used to do workshop drawings of rockets, those same drawings can then be repurposed to make stuff like decal art, laser cut files, patterns, and even assembly jigs. I've attached a sample drawing.

James
 

Attachments

  • Hydac Senior Scale Workshop Drawing.pdf
    327.8 KB · Views: 12
dr wogz said:
While you may want a drafting program, you also may need to learn how to draft! Look up drafting basics, or drawing layout to see what I mean. Remember, drafting is an art, and is typically a course in a trade school or university.. take your time, ask questions, show us what you've done so far & we can coach you along!

Your drawing above is 3 views [orthographic views]: a side view a bottom view and a detailed view. (Ideally, the side view & end view should be the same scale, and in line with each other. Views are just that, various views in relation to each other: front - top - side - bottom. You can then get fancy views to show more detail: detail views, or a section view, to see a cut-away view. You then get into Isometric views to show a 3D view of the 'thing' (but there are rules to isometric views too!) note: we typically use '3rd angle projection in N. America

If you want the 2D approach, draw it as you would draw it with a pencil: a long rectangle for the body, a triangle for the fin, then draw teh tip cord & trim the overshoot lines. The, copy the parts you want a s details ad scale up. The nosecone is a challenge as it'll be a curve, or spline thru a series of points.

Then add notes. Most drafting programs have a "dimension" tool that will automatically add dimensions when you pick 2 points. this is where you fid out if you've drawn it properly, to scale!

and all these elements should be on layers, so you can see what you're doing, turn off / hide the bits you don't need a the moment, and assign properties to each layer, such a s line types & line weights.


In today's world of mechanical design & drafting the part are designed in 3D so they can be fitted together to check for fitment & alignment . From this 3D part, you can extract the view you want into your drawing. but this doe stake more time up front, but saves lots of time downstream..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi...sides can,include plan, elevation and section.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineering_drawing
https://fractory.com/engineering-drawing-basics/
Click to expand...
Make UK does a pretty good one too you can see here: https://www.makeuk.org/insights/blogs/how-to-read-engineering-drawings-a-simple-guide
 
For a good 2D CAD program Siemens has Solid Edge 2D available for free. Just starting to use it myself and it seems to have all the features needed to do drafting. Did I mention it is free :) .
 
Speaking of "free"... I haven't installed this yet since I have another CAD program, but Freecad appears to be a great program.

Update: I downloaded FreeCAD 20.2 and started making a model... and started getting error messages... thus far, I'm not impressed.

https://www.freecad.org/
 
Last edited:
Bruiser said:
Could it be that if I change the type (architectural, decimal, engineering / scientific) it might also change that? I'm not sure I can change the type but I'll check that out tonight.

You were safe to assume that I am not doing layers. I understand the concept but not how to make them all work together. I read I can toggle each layer so I can see it or not see it but I'm not how they work together. Like for printing, will it only print what I am viewing on the screen?
Click to expand...
Changing the dimension type will probably change the format of the numbers like going from feet and inches to just inches, that's the way AutoCAD works.

Layers are a way to categorize your lines. With lines drawn on different layers it is easy to change the properties of lines on a layer all at the same time- things like color, line thickness, dashed lines, etc. It is also easy to turn a layer on or off so you can hide one type of thing while working on another type of thing. This is very helpful if you are working on something complicated.

I have AutoCAD (and Revit) on my work computer. I've used AutoCAD since about its beginning to create drawings for buildings, and I use it occasionally for rocketry stuff. My first version of AutoCAD I loaded it on my IBM PC using 9 360k floppy disks. I dread the day when I no longer have access to AutoCAD. I had this list of alternatives for future research:
Nanocad
Qcad
Librecad
freedraft
librecad
draftsight
Freecad
 

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