Btw, the membership page does not work... The problem does not seem to be on my end... Seems to either not work at all or, after refresh, responds VERY slowly. Just FYI.
Great tutorial! I am using version 0.20.1 and there is a new step required to resolve the "Cannot use selected object" issue. after creating the sketch you must create a datum plane and select the gear face. then you can create your pocket on that datum plane. Although I seem to have ran into a bug where, after using the "PolarPattern" tool, only about half of the pockets go all the way through. To correct this issue, instead of using the pocket tool, I use the hole tool and that seems to work flawlessly. Thanks for the tutorial. Keep em coming!
I watched some other freecad videos, but when I watched yours I got a good understanding of model building. So watch and practice all your videos. thanks
Excellent guide, I started FreeCAD by watching the beginner series from you and it helps me so much in understanding the software. It would be great if you could teach us how to use the Assembly 4 add-on in a video.
Many thanks for a great video,but a simpler method for those who are just starting with FreeCAD or just want to make a gear without being a part of something else, is open in Part Design Workbench -New- Add Body,switch to Gear Workbench -Make gear- switch back to Part Design Workbench-select face of gear and make sketch for holes etc.Hope this helps.
FreeCAD is my best modelling friend for a couple of years. But you've just inspired me to move from version 0.16 (which is very simple and straightforward in learning) to latest version with objects and body approach. Sure, 0.16 can also run FCGears, but I feel that I have to evolve.
Been wanting to get started playing with freecad, yours is the best intro I have found - very straightforward, just the right amount of explanation. TY
To answer your request (at 3:17): On Linux, the path to unzip the workbenches is $HOME/.FreeCAD/Mod/. I would expect Mac to be similar, but I don't have one.
Same! I've used OpenSCAD for lots of things over the years, but Fusion360 for more complex stuff. Now that I've switched from Mac to Linux I need something that works there. Haven't done any Fusion360 in about 4 years ago learning FreeCAD is like starting over. If OpenSCAD had just a few more things like fillets, I'd use it for everything.
Thank you for the video, I am sure it will be helpful at some point. So far I managed to design and print a couple relatively simple parts for an anemometer with FreeCAD and your videos have been awesome!
So, ok, in order to select a single start thread on the worm gear, you have to first drag the newly created icon into the body/part icon. Then the operators for adjusting the worm shows up in the lower part of the combo view box.
have you tried my FreeCAD for beginners series? at first it can seem very difficult but it's all about repetition. When you have the process down you can start to unleash you creativity and it becomes more fun!
That's great! Fusion 360 keeps telling me my licenses has expired, tried to see if my system is compatible with Solidworks for makers, they require a Windows workstation with specific hardware, so I started trying to learn FreeCad and am glad there is something to make gears. I have some hobby CNC machines and if I add a 4th axis to the mill I may be able to do a machined finish on the 3D printed gears if needed.
All was OK following this tutorial until placing the holes sketch onto the gear. It did not appear, even though I tried rotating my view. There appears to be too many steps involved (changing between gears add-on, sketcher, part design, etc, ) to logically follow. Can you please slow it down a little bit, and give reasons for changing the workbenches, and EXACTLY WHEN to do so. I'm getting confused by the frequent workbench changes. Otherwise, excellent work - keep it up.
Hi , Just wanted you to know your an awesome teacher , and your videos are great . would you consider making a video on how to make different threads in freecad ? I don,t know how to do a square and acme thread that i want to do interenaly on a part i want to print . Thank you very muck mr Gareth .
Thanks, I was stuck trying to make a low pitch helix in part design. For some reason FreeCAD does not cope well with those. I will try this Gear workbench out.
Great tutorial! Wondering if you can point me to the way to get inside gear correct. Inside gear like the harmonic drive stuff. The teeth should match the gt2 belt profile. Looking forward to how you'll get that done in FreeCad😉
Great tutorial and exposure to another great add-on, makes creating gears easy, however you can't specify a diameter which is not good if your trying to recreate or follow specs from a drawing
Great tutorial, but at 4.16 into the tutorial, your Gear workbench contains the yellow create tool. Mine (using 0.19) does not. I've hit this missing tools problem on other workbenches too. Can you explain how to add a set of tools to a workbench please? I am quite new to FreeCAD admittedly.
Maybe it is just me, but I'm struggling to make holes in a combination spur gear. Can you maybe go more in depth with constraints for holes? There is something all the opencad youtube videos seem to be missing.
This is a GREAT video for GEARS, I need to make SPROCKETS. Gears use other gears, Sprockets use chain. Do you have any thoughts? Anything would be GREAT! Thank you for your time.
Hi Dave, I've never experimented with sprockets personally. Although, I probably wouldn't recommend 3D printing a sprocket and using it with a metal chain as the plastic would get torn to pieces. The only way it could be practical is if you 3D printed the sprocket in metal to use with a real chain or you 3D print a sprocket and chain in plastic (depending how much force is involved).
@@thehardwareguy I would NOT 3D print. I need a 2D image that I can put in a plasma cutter. This is what I THOUGHT would be a good program to do that in. I will never have a 3D printer. I just need to make the 2D images. Thank you again for your time.
Great content!! Thanks for taking the time to make this! How would you create an inside gear? e.g., a ring with teeth on the inside, that can be driven from inside by another gear?
Thanks for the videos, love FreeCAD. One question, though, Why do you need a part for your bodies? I have been using FreeCAD, doing lots of stuff, and I don't remember ever using a part... just different bodies.
Great Video. I didn't know anything about cad before I watched it. I made a 1 piece gt2 gear with a small set screw after watching this video but I need another that has to be split. How would one go about making a split or two piece gear like a timing gear that is held together with small screws? Thanks and keep up the good work. jmk
I'm confused about the whole concept of Part vs Body vs Sketch. I understand that in your project you can have multiple parts, and within the part you can have multiple bodies, and within the body you can have multiple sketches. Is there some documentation somewhere where I can read about when to add a new body or when to have multiple sketches in one body and so on? I'm not looking for an explanation (unless it's deceptively simple), just a place where I can go to learn the best practices. TIA
forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?t=43501 A body is required and must be a single continuous object. You can start with a primitive or a padded sketch inside a body. Within the same body, you can add more sketches based off existing faces or external datum planes. These sketches can support pads or pockets but they must result in one single object. All the sketches in a single body can import geometry from each other. You can have multiple bodies in a Model(file). Parts are optional and basically one level up. They can contain multiple Bodies and you can have multiple Parts in one Model (file). You would use them in lieu of one of the assembly workbenches which were designed to allow you to position multiple Models together. Parts are nice because you can design your device and reference geometry from one part to another (through Shape Binders). If you were designing a reduction gear box, you could have several compound gears(small gear and large gear on the same shaft). Each compound gear would be a Part. The Parts would consist of 3 bodies: small gear, large gear, shaft. The housing would be another Part, as would a cover plate.
I'm hoping I can get an answer before tearing out my hair. I have followd this step by step, but each time I get to clicking the pocket I get the message "Cannot use the selected object.Selected object must belong to active body" The only difference I can see is in the combo menu where you have part highlighted, I have both part and body highlighted in pale blue, not a darker grey like yours.................Sorted it, for whatever reason I am still trying to work out, the body doesn't stay highlighted, therefore the face sketch ends up outside of the body. All I did was drag and dropped the sketch into the body and it then allowed me to pocket the gear as per your demo. So another aspect learned (almost) Your Freecad demo's are by far the easiest to follow for a newcomer.
Hi Brian, to make a body active you must double click on it in the component tree. This should allow you to do what you want👍🏻 Thanks for watching, glad I could help
Great tutorial, thanks! I went ahead and printed the spur gear from your Raptor 2 files and it had 8 holes rather than the 7 shown here. Was the 8 holes version what you actually printed for the project? Has it been sufficiently strong so far?
T.Y. T.Y. T. Y. for showing your FreeCad "technique" Freecad has me koo koo . But your description of stacking in the tree, putting things in order cleared a HUGE confusion
Hi, i have started watching your vidz to get a hang of this program. I am as noob as it comes. I was wondering if you can make or link to a vid that can help me make a new base for my Elgato stream deck XL. i have come as far as making a cube with a hole in it. Super vidz so far. Learing aton each episode.
Hi, thanks for great tutorial! Just wonder - I see you using 0.19 - not realthunder branch, right? But you don't create offset plane when creating sketches on a plane - so is it safe to do so, I red that topological naming bug gonna destroy your model if you going to change sketch, no?
this is a great tutorial but.... the resolution of the screen captures is poor. That's really where you (ok, I) really want clarity to follow with your clear descriptions. Fix that and you'll have a winner!
for some reason, "create body" is not listed inside the tasks tab. i had to manually click on the blue "step" icon to create a new body. not complaining, but it is different than what happens in this video which could be very confusing for new users. i am using version 0.19.4
Great Video, thanks but...once I create a gear with an axis hole (pocket) and polar pattern holes (pockets), I would like to be able to then make a copy of the file and change the number of teeth from 18 to 22 or something like that and have the part rebuild. The Involute Gear doesn't change when I change the number of teeth. The only solution I have found is to delete the pockets and sketches, modify the Involute Gear and then add the pockets back in. Any ideas? Thanks.
Jan 15 2022, followed you all the way to timestamp @09:29 and I get an error message. I click 'ok' on the message and I get a crash, pale screen and blue circle cursor. The message was relating to part selection. unable to follow from that point and I have to restart FreeCad and do over. Ctrl-Alt-Del is a painful way to follow you . The error message is: "Cannot use selected Object. Selected Object must belong to the active body. Consider using a ShapeBinder or a BaseFeature to reference external geometry in a body. " The only option is to click the 'OK' button. Frustrating when your excellent video fails to address options and errors leaving me half way through and no way forward.
Sorry to sound dumb but where is the best place to down load free cad, before i go down the route of buying a printer i want to design my product and slice it and work out print weight and time to see if its cost effective, im a toolmaker and used to making prototypes in metal but 3d printing blows my mind.
can you (anyone?) recommend a tutorial on designing multiple part that fit together ie as completed system. I hope they exist somewhere - but if not, it would be much appreciated! Thanks
I have many troubles. If I make it 48 teeth it will not do the undercut. If i put my shape setting first it will not let me do 48 teeth. If i do the beta/skew/twist and or the helix, it will not do the boloean... Im thinking in the printer it will shrink so having a cad might not be for me as i will just guesstimate the size any way. I need a 5mm hole so Ill go maybe 5.5?
Great tutorial but...... I have ver .2 and have followed step by step creating a timing gear and all goes well until I try to insert a pocket. I keep getting "Cannot use selected object. Selected object must belong to the active body. Consider using Shapefinder or a Basefeature to reference an external geometry in a body." I am lost and would be grateful for any suggestions.
Greetings! I was trying to pocket the face of that gear and the program says I cannot use a selected object must belong to an active body. It said to consider using a shape binder or base feature to reference external geometry in a body. Can you tell me what I'm looking at here as I have recently done your other one with a pocket in a cube and that worked fine! Thanks in advance for all your help!
Hello! On your part tree on the left, double click on a body to make it active. You'll know when it's active because the name of the body will turn bold.
How good of a replacement is FreeCAD to Fusion? My main issue with it for now is not being able to extrude multiface sketches and some stability issues. It can crash unexpectedly. Are there parameters like in Fusion where you can set one measurement as a variable and use it?
FreeCAD doesn't come close to Fusion 360 in my opinion. I personally find FreeCAD very frustrating to use. Each to their own though, we're just lucky to have so many options to choose from!
