Simplify Your 3D Modelling, Leverage Part Design Primitives | Basic Beginners FreeCAD 0.22 Lesson 14

Welcome Lesson 14 of our Basic Beginners FreeCAD course! In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to model using 3D geometric primitives. These basic shapes are essential for building complex models quickly and efficiently. Whether you're a beginner or an experienced designer, mastering primitives will help streamline your 3D modeling process in FreeCAD.

What You’ll Learn in This Tutorial:
* Introduction to 3D geometric primitives in CAD (cubes, spheres, cylinders, etc.)
* How to use additive and subtractive operations in FreeCAD part design
* Simplifying complex models with a layered approach
* Step-by-step modeling of a spherical cover
* Refining shapes with subtractive operations and fillets
* Time-saving tips for improving your CAD workflow

We’ll demonstrate how to build a spherical dome on top of a curved base by combining additive and subtractive techniques. You’ll see how primitives can simplify design and reduce the need for complex sketches. By the end of this video, you'll have a solid understanding of how to create, modify, and optimize your 3D models using these essential building blocks.

Whether you're using Fusion 360, SolidWorks, or FreeCAD, these techniques will apply across all platforms, helping you become more efficient in your designs.

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[mrdr]

As always excellent !!! I specifically like Your style of explaining beforehand in broad terms what You are about to do, as well as mentioning alternative ways to solve the same tasks... Gold content for prospective FreeCad'ers :)
Best regards

[foxjet]

Subscribed. Thank you for the great tutorials.

[flapjack]

These beginner videos are SO GREAT, thank you! I do wish you'd explain a few things, though: What the hell does "Inertial CS" mean, and why would making that arc in the sketch tangent to the other one you pulled in as an external geometry "cause problems, " as you said?

[leroycasterline]

I love this series! Although I've been using FreeCAD for some time (although I don't consider myself proficient yet), I've learned more than I expected when I started this series.

At about 13:30, where we remove the excess sphere material, you could Pocket 'Up to face" and select the face on the far side of the arched base rather than using a dimension. Presumably, that way if the extrusion length of the base changes, the pocket depth would change with it.

As for creating the pocket sketch on the face of the base, has the TNP been resolved such that this is now considered safe? I ask because I had a project break after adding a feature to a base object a few weeks ago (using the then-current dev version which reportedly had the TNP fix).

[InsertCleverUsername]

I'm curious why you drew a second arc around 13:00 instead of removing the construction geometry attribute from the external geometry?

It'd also be interesting to see you create the dome with other tools/workbenches in FreeCAD.

[jwatkins]

Hopefully some day we'll be able to use reference geometry in sketches as regular geometry while keeping the reference, so you don't have to create duplicate entity over it, which on a bspline, would be far more difficult to do depending on the original reference. Yup, normally use other ways, but direct reference is the most intuitive way.

[forresterickson]

I came to see if you had some lessons with the RC1 and watching this want to ask if and where back in your videos the Version 0.22 was close enough that I could use it to transition to the new RC1?

I have only recently moved from 0.19 to 0.21. I stayed with 0.19 because there were so many excellent tutorials in 0.19.

[kotqrka]

Can't you attach a subtractive sphere to your existing additive one?