MCAD Mechanical Computed Aided Design

Many different types of CAD software Depends on purpose MCAD for mechanical design ECAD for electronic design – later For achitecture For artists....

Many common and not so common MCAD programs CATIA IDEAS Solid Edge Solid Works FreeCad AutoCAD Blender We have chosen Solid Edge and we have a site licence for this

Different parts in MCAD Part design – Sketch – Modify dimensions Assembly Analysis – Stress and Strain, Finite element methods Motion – interference Using structural information to study fields – Field Solvers – temperature, E/M fields, particle trajectories (GEANT)

MCAD output Structure data base 2-d Drawing Rendered images Manufacturing data – to NC machines, 3d- printers Analysis data

Different strategies In IDEAS you start with basic 3d-structures (blocks, cyliders etc.) and use Boolean operations to construct complex structures In Solid Edge you draw 2d-objects in different planes and extrude them in the 3rd dimension

Complexity Professional MCAD programs are usually very complex The same object can be achieved in different ways and there are a large number of refinements and parameters for the different commands Start with a few basic commands and learn more when you need it

Schedule This session – Learn basic operations with Solid Edge Next session – Describe the candle holder, loaded dice Last session – Stress and strain analysis, moving designs

Solid Edge