How much difference is there in the user experience between AutoCAD and Fusion?

[prantsaga90]

I am an engineer with a small scientific equipment company.

I joined them and found out that they use AutoCAD for their designs of parts for 3D printing and machining of (mainly) aluminum parts.

I was new to AutoCAD (having superficially used Solidworks before) and taught myself to the point where I can get what I need rather efficiently and fast (if I do say so myself).

Now, motivation: Why do I want to skip ship now that I've taught myself AutoCAD? The deeper I go, the more I see how AutoCAD does not seem to directly cater to people in my situation. I am currently trying to export a 3D drawing as .step file...... This is going so well that I felt the urge to compose this post.

So: can someone tell me how much difference there is in the user experience (UI, commands etc.) between AutoCAD and Fusion? I am considerign suggesting that we switch to Fusion for the next licence period. It took me ~5 months to get to where I am and don't really have the time to start over with yet another CAD program.

Many thanks in advance!

[j.palmeL29YX]

One of the main differences (and advantages of fusion): In Fusion you can create and edit parametric driven 3D models. In AutoCAD is parametric restricted to 2D geometry only.  

And of course not to forget the included Animation, Simulation, Manufacture, ... if you need. 

In case you have experience in another 3D-CAD (e.g. Inventor or SW as you wrote) the learning curve will be not very steep. 

[AVCPlugins]

Not much I know about Fusion tells me it's another one of 100,500 parametric programs. (Correct me if this is not the case). So your experience of direct fast "thoughtless" modeling in AutoCAD will be absolutely useless. You won't be able to model an assembly by simply cutting parts off a box blank. You will not be able to resize assemblies by simply dragging the faces of all solids in the desired direction. You will have to learn a completely different command system with completely different options, settings and features. In general, such programs do not have any command system, since there is no professional command line. You will be forced to build flat sketches for every detail. Moreover, the dimensions of the part must arise from somewhere in advance - you will have to calculate with a calculator or come up with tricky formulas with parameters or build long chains of parametric dependencies, which are then easily destroyed, destroying the entire assembly. In general, you will get everything that is so annoying in parametric programs. And lose absolutely everything you are used to in AutoCAD. If you are missing something minor in AutoCAD, then it is easier to solve this problem with add-ons and plugins. Or you can use another, more powerful dwg-CAD system with the same set of basic commands. These already exist.

[TheCADnoob]

Generally, fusion is an entirely different approach to designing than AutoCAD. 

The basic ideas of how things are constructed are similar, but the way projects are set up and parts and assemblies are organized and managed is a big difference. 

If you are used to AutoCAD, it will seem frustrating trying to make Fusion behave like AutoCAD. You will have to change how you approach problems and probably the sequence of those solutions to meet the way the program actually works. 

All that said the features and tools available in Fusion are fantastic. The concept of having a timeline for your design (its a sequence of all your design that lives on the bottom of your screen) has come in so handy. There is a pretty healthy community as well. I have been 'school of hard knocking' my way through fusion and its a pretty slick program. For me there are some pretty simple AutoCAD features that seem to be missing in fusion, but i usually find out that they are missing because I'm approaching the design in the wrong way. Also it has an very quick paces development cycle so new things are being developed quite rapidly. So even if there is something that you really need or want that's missing it may be something that will be coming soon. 

From the description of your work, I would think Fusion (or inventor) might be a better fit for what yall do. This is with the big caveat that if yall are an long time AutoCAD shop you will likely have a harder time changing internal  process than you will learning fusion. 

If i were you i would recommend running a pilot program and see if you think its something yall could pull off. There are tool specific to machining that are a part of the fusion landscape as well (https://www.autodesk.com/products/fusion-360/blog/fusion-360-machining-extension/) which may make it worth the test.