Display full version of the post: General CAD questions

ukStudent
03.03.2008, 19:36
Basically just found that in a weeks time we will be studying CAD at college as part of my motorsport course, so would like to do a bit of research into it instead of turning up to my first lesson and not knowing anything.
 
This is what i would like to know:
 

The main features of CAD and its uses in modern motorsport.
 
The advantages and disadvantages of CAD when compared to manual drafting methods.
 
cheers, DaaveukStudent2008-03-03 19:43:49

drawsalot
06.03.2008, 17:52
Dave I do not know much about motorsports however I do know a bit about cad. More specifically using cad for drawing and engineering. Cad is a great program, but it is a huge program. Cad has the ability to be customized to your drawing needs in what ever field you are in. It is great for precision and editing for engineering purposes. It will save you a lot of time drawing compared to manual drafting. That is once you get a hang of drawing on the computer. The biggest challenge is finding your work style and work process to be really proficient at it. Like I said it is great for straight line drawing and engineering. With that said, the biggest down fall drawing on the computer is the lack there of a sense of scale. It is easy to draw something in real scale by sketching it but it is difficult to determine scale on the screen without having a reference of some sort. So for example" if your are drawing a motor bike draw an average person standing next to it to scale and reference. Also it is difficult to draw suttle curves and fluid shapes with curves. It is not impossible. It takes a lot of time and experiance to do so. Hop emy rambling helps.