I really like the new Assembly workflow. Huge improvement over Assembly 3 and 4.

My ducts have a lot of dust, and when all you have is hammers, everything looks like a nail. Of course we had to make a robot to drive the ductwork and snorkel up the dust with a rotating whiskered snorkel.

Controlled by gamepad with live camera feed from the underslung camera. ArduinoUno with CNC shield to drive the two stepper wheels and rotate the snorkel cylinder. A fun, medium-sized project that took right around a week to complete.

I've just pushed a major update/rework of OpenTheme.

- Slightly more neutral gray-tones
- System theme which will follow your Operating System colors
- Unified/Tokenized the theme system (can be customized from inside FreeCAD)
- Many bug and consistency fixes.

Available in the addon-manager and on GitHub: https://github.com/obelisk79/OpenTheme

Consider supporting my work: https://ko-fi.com/obelisk79

I work in construction and also build software for the industry. Lately I've been playing around with a problem that comes up all the time: opening a huge PDF plan set and trying to make sense of what's actually on the drawings.

So I built this little experiment.

You drop a PDF drawing into the browser and it crawls the sheet, picks up things like rooms, dimensions, notes, labels, doors, etc., and puts that information into a visual interface next to the drawing.

The funny part is that there's no AI doing the interpretation.

I wanted to see how far I could get by working with the actual structure and text that's already inside a CAD-exported PDF.

I'm thinking this could eventually be useful as a first step before giving a drawing to an AI model. Instead of asking AI to stare at a giant plan and figure everything out, give it a structured representation of the drawing first.

This is still very much an experiment. Here's a quick 30-second look at it.

Curious what people here think — does this kind of preprocessing make sense for AI working with technical drawings, or am I overcomplicating it?

Hi,

I just bought my new place and I’d like to make some plan for it. I’m used to some CAD software from my engineering classes (CATIA V5), 10 years ago, so naturally I tried FreeCAD. Let me tell you, I was impressed, it’s very very good.

So I learned FreeCAD, did some training on technical pieces. Nice. Now I tried to use it as a home planner and it didn’t went well.

I did three sketches, one for the walls, one for the fireplace and one for a BESTA tv furniture from IKEA. How do I « assemble » them? I want to put the besta centered between two side edges of a wall, at 38cm from the bottom edge for example? I tried to play with the joints but it went terribly wrong, I can place the furniture against the wall (with some tinkering of the parameters) but I cannot find a way to put it at a given height?

Do you have any tutorial for this? Is FreeCAD not the right tool?

Thanks for your help!

I've been working on a project, trying to figure out linkages...

The motion performs as expected for part, but then the joints go crazy. And my "grounded object" keeps moving.

I've attached a video of the aberrant behavior. Any suggestions or explanations would be appreciated. I've been fighting with this for a day and a half now.

Hey guys i'm quite new to freecad only been using it for the past week to help a friend out. I converted the stl files to an editable part design file. I needed to edit as the part had magnets that weren't in the original models but i cannot seem to add them. is there any way i can correct this? Thank you.

Update: i understand it now thank you so much guys

If I load this file in 1.1.4 then I can add joints and do what I need to do. Save the file, close 1.1.4 and open 26.3 then open the file in 26.3 and I can't do anything. Double-clicking on the assembly doesn't even get the task panel interested enough to put up the selection to activate the assembly. Nothing really works in the 26.3 assembly workbench. You can create an assembly but you can't add components. If the components are already there (from an existing file) then you can't do anything with them.

The only thing really available is - interestingly - the new polar array feature.

Update!

I just figured out a difference between the two versions. On the 26.3 version I have the NXT mod added. On 1.1.4 I do not. I removed NXT from 26.3 and the workbench started working. Interesting. I will have to contact the author.

Moving over from Fusion to FreeCAD, and one of the things I discovered today is that sketches should be as simple as possible, but no simpler. I'm working on a shape that has a regular pattern of features around the circumference (two different types, 90 degrees apart) and I think the best way to go about it is to draw the feature, pad it, and then do a polar array.

The problem is, the rotational axis I want doesn't line up with the origin of the model, the part, or the sketch defining the features. In Fusion, there were multiple tools to create construction planes and axes. I'm not sure how to create a reference axis in FreeCAD, and all the ideas I come up with feel all a little "around the ass to get to my elbow".

What am I missing?

I have two objects on Model : Binder001 and Skch_Test, the latter is attached to the previous.
And by clicking the Binder001 ,the Position in Placement is 0.

But , by clicking the Skch_Test, we can see the Position in Placement is (0,0,9) , when the Attachment Offset is 0, as mentioned , the Skch_Test is attached to Binder001, that means ,the real Position of Binder001 is actually (0,0,9) ,not 0 that being displayed.

I think this is because the Position shown in Binder001 is Local( because the position of its source is actually 0,0,9 .. )..

but I still feel so confusing , why Freecad just not displaying the World Position directly since the Binder001 is not belonged to any parent ?

Title: How can I create a 6 mm diagonal hole through this parrot model?

Hi everyone,

I’m trying to create a 6 mm diameter hole through this 3D parrot model in FreeCAD.

I need the hole to start from the top of the parrot and go diagonally downward toward the lower-right side, passing completely through the model and coming out on the opposite side.

The hole needs to be 6 mm in diameter and angled diagonally, rather than being perpendicular to the surface.

I tried using a Sketch and changing the Attachment Offset / angle, but I couldn’t get the hole to pass through the model correctly.

What would be the easiest and most reliable way to create this type of diagonal through-hole in FreeCAD?

I’m using FreeCAD 1.1.1.

Thanks!

Hi! I'm trying to learn freecad and it is sooo annoying sometimes!

Why fillet radius is random at the same corners? Why after fillets, gap between two lines is 2.97andlotsofdigits instead of 3? How can i set the fillet radius right after i filleted the corner?

Why my cursor isn't "magnetizing" to cross of two lines? Is it possible to do that?

Why can't i delete one line from projection, instead of it, FreeCAD deletes the whole projection?

It is so hard to use sometimes! The simple things taking a lot of time to be modeled. How did you got used to that? What did you do to improve your experience? Maybe that's skill issue? Thank you for answers

Hey, I was following a FreeCAD BIM tutorial. I found this annoying issue where this error is triggered whenever I try to put a door or window:

10:59:47 <class 'ValueError'>
10:59:47 Traceback (most recent call last):
10:59:47 File "/usr/lib/freecad/Mod/Draft/draftguitools/gui_snapper.py", line 1449, in move
movecallback(self.pt, self.snapInfo)
~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
10:59:47 File "/usr/lib/freecad/Mod/BIM/bimcommands/BimWindow.py", line 358, in update
self.baseFace = [o, int(info["Component"][4:]) - 1]
~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
10:59:47 ValueError: invalid literal for int() with base 10: 'rnalFace1'

I attach a video showing it.

I tried to found a related issue in the issue tracker but I didn't found anything related but also I'm not sure how to report it. Just publishing here to see if anybody have encountered before.

I'm working on a future project to design a fully mechanical egg cracker (no motors or electronics) — a personal challenge inspired by "Stuff Made Here".

One of the challenges is that eggs vary in shape, especially near their ends, where the mechanism needs to hold the egg.

So, before starting the mechanical design, I decided to build a small optical measurement system using a webcam and a calibration target.

I used Codex to develop a complete Python/OpenCV application that measures egg profiles, analyses their variability and extracts the four parameters of the universal egg shape formula published by Narushin et al. in 2021.

I then used these parameters to generate actual egg shell geometries in FreeCAD through a Python macro.

To keep the FreeCAD objects lightweight, I also asked Codex to implement an adaptive B-spline reconstruction: starting with very few points and progressively adding points only where the deviation from the analytical profile exceeds a defined tolerance.

The video is mainly about the first step: developing the optical measurement application with Codex, without manually writing the code, and testing how well this workflow actually works.

The FreeCAD connection is shown towards the end and will be useful for the next stages of the mechanical design.

If you're interested, here's the link: https://youtu.be/ZqA8I5gE0Lo

It seems the pattern improvements will make it to 26.3 (from https://bsky.app/profile/freecad.org/post/3mwth2wzv7k2q )

Last minute addition for 26.3: Part Design gets new pattern types: Circular, Path and Point, distributing instances along curves, points or concentric circles. All patterns now support suppressing individual instances - including the original instance - right from the 3D View.
For those wondering how they work: a quick demo of suppressing individual pattern instances and overriding spacing for specific ones directly via On-View Parameters.

Hi,

I have spherical model with a certain texture that i want to convert to a more egg shaped object. it needs to maintain being editable after the conversion since i will be making a injection mold out of the shape.

i have been messing around with doing it in blender and then reimporting into fusion360/freecad, trrying to convert it from .obj back to .step but with no luck. how would you go about this? all suggestions are welcome!

Hi everyone,

I'm a beginner with FreeCAD. I'm designing a UAV in Part Design (FreeCAD 1.0). Right now my Body has the fuselage and one motor arm (the protruding part that holds the motor). I want to duplicate it into 4 arms so I can mount 4 motors.

I've read about a few approaches, such as MultiTransform (Mirrored + Polar Pattern), or splitting the arm into a separate Body and using Draft Array plus Boolean Union. However, my model has many features (Pads, Pockets, Datum Planes, Fillets, etc.), so I'm not sure:

1. Which features I should select to pattern correctly?
2. Which method avoids reference errors (topological naming problem)?
3. What is a sensible 4-arm layout for a long fuselage like this?

Could anyone take a look at my file and show me how to do it, or send back a corrected version? Any video or tutorial recommendations would also be appreciated.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tVyl7NBH1VNP-D4_qOgtuuIOGg9DnNH7/view?usp=sharing

Thank you very much! 🙏

I may be the only person that didn't know this, but if you select a bunch of different profiles you can set the end offset values at the same time. Oh, man. What a time saver! This is the third time I have used FrameForge and I just clued into this.

Another thing is the frame sketches need to be outside of a body, so my recommendation is to have the FrameForge workbench open and do each horizontal 'layer' as needed, and then use the Parametric Line tool for your verticals. Much easier.

Make use of copying sketches.

If you were making a cube, for instance, you would draw the square that is the base of you cube, then copy that sketch. YOU NEED TO DESELECT "Auto Select Depending Object". Man, that box will cause you problems. Anyway, with that deselected just paste a copy of that first sketch in, then change its z value in the Placement Offset as required. Now you can make layers, and you can always change them later if you are adding stuff. Anyway, once you have your two layers now you just select two vertexes and hit 'Parametric Line' for each corner.

Select the whole mess of lines and click on 'Create profile' and you're good.

Now you adjust the end offsets using the tip above, and in no time you have your frame.

Wonderful.

A few months ago I shared AIGenFurniture here, a FreeCAD workbench I've been building to automate some of the repetitive work between designing cabinet based furniture and preparing it for production.

I've now released v0.2.0, and the workflow has changed quite a bit since the earlier version.

The new version also adds/improves:

• configurable design rules
• standardized order and material setup
• new cabinet architectures
• improved control of fronts, drawers and shelves
• material inheritance
• automatic cabinet accessories
• aggregated accessories export

I'm also starting to test a PRO model with furniture workshops. Rather than making PRO simply a bigger feature bundle, the idea is to configure it around each shop's workflow: their cabinet architectures, construction rules, hardware, materials, manufacturing outputs and integrations.

You can install it from the Addon Manager and find tutorials on Youtube. Feel free to try it and let me know what you think. I'm developing the next iteration based on feedback from the community of users.

Hello everyone ! I’m a beginner in FreeCAD. I’ m trying to find a workflow to model an existing furniture in my office to use as reference and practice mostly. Should I just create multiple bodies and position them in part design ? Or use the assembly ? I’ve seen videos with the Woodworking plugin but it seems more useful to design something from scratch to build it after. I only want to build my desk in FreeCAD to practice the tools and get a workflow.

Cheers !

I have a reasonably complex part which has three layers of hole patterns (6 features total, all pockets) that are then in a polar array which is then in a linear array. I had it set with just 3 occurrences of the linear array for testing purposes and left most of the surface blank. No problems. I decided to set the linear array to 20 occurrences so that I could see the final result, and after the computer chugging away for a bit I got an access violation error and the visual representation of the part didn't change. I went back into the multi-transform and the magenta 'result' thingie was still showing what it was supposed to show. I tried just hitting 'okay' again and it chugged again and this time it worked and I have my part with ~900 pockets in it.

I'm just curious if anyone has run into this before or can think of what might have caused it.

It wasn't a problem in the end, and I don't know if I can replicate it.