How to sign up for Preview Technology (ARCHIVED)

[promm]

Thank you for your interest in helping us develop the tools for the future of design to manufacturing.  Technology previews gather customer feedback around business goal/objectives that the new functionality intends to solve, while the development approaches release.  Each preview will start with a small group of users invited, and we’ll continue to expand based off feedback and community interest.  The information you provide will be used to ensure we’re reaching our target audience, gathering feedback from diverse backgrounds and experience levels.

Please respond to this thread with the following details and you’ll be added to the list of users we pull from with each new preview:

• Previous CAD experience.
• What do you typically model / design?
• What about the technology preview got your interest?
• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

This part is important - there is no guarantee that the models you make now will function properly once the preview technology is fully released.  Please consider this when utilizing your time testing this functionality.

[clickdraw]

• Previous CAD experience.

Software I've used and currently use is Solidworks, Sketchup Pro, V-Carve, CorelDraw and of course Fusion 360. I have just started using Sketchbook Pro and will purchase once my trial is up in a few days. I am amazing at the power of Fusion 360 and what it can do. I hope to start using it as my main software if possible. Haven't tried or played with the Cam aspect but am hoping I can use it with our CNC Router at work. 

• What do you typically model / design?

I work at Industrial Plastics on Vancouver Island, BC, Canada. We are a very unique business that caters to anyone, retail/wholesale/industrial. We have a plastics fabrication shop as one portion of our services. We fabricate anything from replacement boat windows, instrument panels, POP displays, etc. Basically anything that can be cut, bent, glued, foamed and assembled from plastic sheet. A lot of our jobs require cutting a flat panel to specific shapes, and then bent at specific places and angles. We have a 5' x 10' MultiCam CNC Router, a 4'x 3' bed 150 watt laser and have just acquired a 3D printer. We are getting new customers and jobs consistently because of what we are capable. of fabricating.

• What about the technology preview got your interest?

I saw a post on Facebook from the Fusion 360 page about how Autodesk was testing the new upcoming Sheet Metal feature and one could possibly help by testing and providing feedback. I am very passionate about design and fabrication but even more so when it involves direct use of design software. To me, there is nothing more gratifying then designing a product/project using 3D software, maybe using other software for visual presentation to a client, building there project and handing them their finished product. If I can help test and provide useful positive feedback so other can enjoy and benefit from this new feature, I would love to help.

• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

This new feature will allow me to design many jobs entirely in Fusion 360. I can model the project whether it be one piece or multiple pieces, Render the project for the client for a professional presentation, unfold the model and generate a DXF file to be used on our CNC Router, laser and even use our 3D Printer. Fabricating using plastic sheet is a very similar to sheet metal. There is definitely some thinking involved when you have to draw a part in 2D when that part has multiple bends that need to be accurate. I feel I could be useful in helping test this new feature. I really appreciate the chance, thank you.

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Best Regards,

Jeff Osborne

604-551-5406

[dnphipps]

Hello,

I would like to preview the Sheet Metal tools!

My previous CAD experience is everything I have learned using Fusion 360 for the last two years.

We presently use Fusion 360 to create sheet metal models of synthesizer enclosures, using 'old school' bend radius and k-factor rules.

Even without dedicated sheet metal tools, we have successfully designed and put into production a keyboard enclosure using Fusion360 exclusively.

I would love to be able to create more complex shapes and bends, beyond simple sketching tools.

Our workflow and communication would be greatly improved, as our simple Fusion360 models are currently 'translated' to production by our sheet metal manufacturer.

Very excited to put these tools to use!

David Phipps

Supersynthesis.com

[DWhiteley]

I am the Technical Director of an Autodesk VAR.

We have been a VAR for 22 years and we sell & support the MFG products including the Autodesk Simulation portfolio.

I have been previewing Inventor for the last 10 years.

Dave Whiteley

Envisage UK Ltd

www.envisageuk.com

[Anonymous]

• Previous CAD experience.
  • 28 yrs of CAD experience ranging from SDRC Ideas, Pro/E, Inventor, Solidworks, and now Fusion 360
• What do you typically model / design?
  • Typical designs today include 5-axis cnc machined housings, sheetmetal components, sculpted injection molded plastics, and imported ECAD components
• What about the technology preview got your interest?
  • right now I'm very interested in reviewing the new sheetmetal capabilities
  • also very interested in the upcoming Eagle ECAD release
• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?
  • I'm looking very hard at replacing Solidworks with Fusion 360 for our production CAD tool.  Still in benchmark mode, but sheetmetal design capability will be a key factor.

Thanks!

Rod

[Anonymous]

• Previous CAD experience.
  • AutoCAD, Rhino, SolidWorks. Everything from injection molded consumer products, to furniture, to large architectural features. Focus on DFM on CNC routers and 3D printers.
• What do you typically model / design?
  • Currently working at a design/build firm with a focus on restaurants and hospitality. Lots of furniture and architectural features. Lots of wood and weldments, as well as sheet metal.
• What about the technology preview got your interest?
  • Tired of doing sheet metal design by hand. Also hoping for the possibility of a drawings tech preview (I'm tired of importing my Fusion models into Rhino to do multi-page shop drawings). Looking to see how these additions will impact the CAD workflow at my company before the wide release to speed our adoption of Fusion as the primary CAD tool.
• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?
  • Having sheet metal will save tons of time and allow us to do more complex features. I'm used to having SolidWorks, but at my new company it's not an investment they're looking to make, and I ultimately see Fusion as being a better answer to our CAD needs. Since I'm the one driving a lot of the CAD purchasing decisions having visibility to these features before the release let's me advocate for Fusion better and preps me to train the designers on the functionality when the release comes.

[jeevesme]

Previous CAD experience:

  Adobe Illustrator 

  Adobe Photoshop

  TinkerCAD

  Onshape

  123D Design

  Meshmixer

  Sketchup

What do you typically model / design?

  Tanks, vessels, electronic housings, various items for 3d printing, toys, household objects

What about the technology preview got your interest?

  SHEET METAL! Being able to help a program like Fusion 360 grow is awesome.  I'm always looking for things that I can learn.  I got into 3d modeling last year, I've learned the 3d modeling programs  mentioned above.  A few months ago i really got into fusion 360 and seen how much easier it is to make changes to the model compared to the others.

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

  I don't plan on using sheet metal function for actual sheet metal (although i may).  I want to see what the program CAN do, not necessarily what it's MADE to do. 

[ggolem]

• Previous CAD experience.

- After years of 3D modelling and experience on 3D Studio and Maya, I began using Solid Works 10 years ago for a sheet metal scanner enclosure. Then i moved to inventor when i switched to Mac (ParallelsDesktop)

• What do you typically model / design?

Generally parts to produce with 3d printers, most of the time functional parts. Sometimes for Cnc routers. Sheet metal enclosures.

• What about the technology preview got your interest?

Sheet Metal

• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

I'm in the process of moving to Fusion360 from Inventor. I've been trying out the Fusion360's modelling, assembly and rendering for a week or so. Now i have a small job which i need to model a simple sheet metal enclosure and produce a nice render with it, and Fusion360's default materials and rendering is great.

In general this technology will be much convenient for me, because i won't need to go back to Parallels Desktop/Inventor chain just for sheet metal designs.

[FMP360]

• Previous CAD experience.
  • 15-years of Autodesk Inventor
  • 1-year of Fusion 360
  • Autocad mechanical
• What do you typically model / design?
  • Components for the beer and wine industries. 
  • Tap handles, brewery and tap house equipment
  • Fixtures for manufacturing
• What about the technology preview got your interest?
  • We are developing new products that are manufactured from sheet metal (stainless) and the ease of design looked great.
• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?
  • We could quickly mock up examples for customers and create drawing and models for the sheet metal fabricator if the job was a go.

Cheers,

Mike

[Anonymous]

Previous CAD experience: solid works, rhino.
What do you typically model / design? Autobody
What about the technology preview got your interest?
Seems to be a solid stable platform, so far so good.
How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?
I hope it will, that remains to be seen.

[Aadithya01]

Hi,

Previous CAD experience

The softwares that I have worked on for my projects are Creo and Solidworks . Currently I work at USAM CADSOFT a company run by my dad and is a gold partner of Autodesk under the name (USAM Technology Solutions India Private Limited).. I am taking care of the technical operations of the company and I currently do demos and benchmarks using AutoCAD Mechanical , Inventor Professional (especially for mold design) and Fusion 360 Ultimate.. 

What do you typically model / design?

Our region has a good base of companies in Sheetmetal and Pump Industries (Tier 1) and Foundries and I am currently working at customer sites for benchmarks in Mold design Inventor , Core and Cavity - Fusion 360 , CAM - Fusion 360 upto 3 Axis and Ultimate for 4 Axis prospects . Our region doesn't have companies with 5 Axis in a large extent. 

What about the technology preview got your interest?

Rather than just sitting and complaining that this feature is not there , that feature is not there .. I would really want to go ahead with knowing the solutions that will be released in Future before itself and from the bottom of my heart Fusion 360 is so special for me in that case. 

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

Will definitely give me a Sound knowledge about the Future Capabilities of the product and will make me sound during demos and will let my mind to help the customers and prospects in our region to any extent .

This is all what I have got in my mind and heart . Love working with you guys

Looking forward for a positive response 

S.B. Aadithya

Application Engineer

+91 93828 49550

aadithya@usam.in

[JBerns]

Fusion 360 Team,

Requesting access to the Preview Technology:

Previous CAD experience.

• AutoCAD (since 1985), AutoSOLID, AME, RoboCAD, AutoCAD Mechanical, IDEA-S, MDT, INVENTOR (since Rubicon)

What do you typically model / design?

• Simple industrial parts or consumer goods for training videos

What about the technology preview got your interest?

• How it will compare to the Inventor sheet metal functionality.

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

• Modeling sheet metal components using sheet metal commands will be much easier.
• Eliminate need to model in Inventor and then import into Fusion.
• Software must be able to document as well as, if not better than, Inventor.

I look forward to your reply.

Regards,

Jerry

[Anonymous]

Previous CAD experience.

2 yrs Fusion 360

13yrs Solid Works

10yrs AutoCAD (1000s of floor plans and several photo mask design for MEMS devices),

4yrs Conventorware (dynamic MEMS devices)

10yrs EagleCAD

some other cheap plotters for photomasks

What do you typically model / design?

In our ProtoLab:  I'm the resident ME & Design Engineer for our Electrical Engineering Department.  I help research groups and Sr. Design groups realize their hardware.  

In our Semiconductor Lab: I also design and fabricate custom Semiconductor equipment or parts

In my Hobbies:  I design custom Furniture and lil life hacks from time to time

The Fabrication Equipment used:  Tormach PCNC, Cirqoid CNC, Ultimaker 2+, Formlabs 1+, vintage but fully featured machine shop

What about the technology preview got your interest

The sheet metal features

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

I have wanted Fusion to bring a wrap feature for some time.  We make wearable prototypes that would benefit from a wrap function and would love to design patterned cylinders for several mechanical and optical devices.  Also, we are shopping for a laser cutter.  I would love to use the sheet metal feature to design acrylic enclosures to be cut by the laser than, using a nichrome wire and apparatus, heat bend the acrylic sheet into a finished enclosure.  I have several designs to cover noisy devices while providing visibility.  Covering UV sensitive gear or research in white rooms....

Most importantly, this would eliminate need for using Solidworks on certain designs.  Thus, with Fusion 360 cloud, increasing collaboration potential on such designs.

Hope it isn't too late and my applications fit your parameters.  I would love to get an early peak at the new sheetmetal features!

[Anonymous]

Hello,

I am interested in previewing the sheet metal tools. I am currently working on two sheet metal design projects that I could use them on immediately. 

• Previous CAD experience. 10 years experience doing 3D CAD professionally with Ashlar Vellum Cobalt, Autodesk Fusion and Inventor, and SOLIDWORKS. I primarily use Fusion right now.
• What do you typically model / design? I design and model a wide range of parts from 2D waterjet cut parts to sheet metal parts, machined 3D parts, and complex assemblies. 
• What about the technology preview got your interest? Sheet Metal please!!!
• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow? As I am currently using Fusion as my primary CAD system and it doesn't have sheet metal functionality at all yet, previewing the sheet metal tools will be a dramatic improvement!

Thanks for considering me!

Theo

[irie0815]

Previous CAD experience: AutoCAD.
What do you typically model / design? A novice Laser Cuts and ready to get productive 🙂
What about the technology preview got your interest?
Sheet metal design is exactly what Iam missing in fusion 360
How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?
It could be a very good approach to get solid transitions between 3D and 2D design to precise parts more efficient

[charlyrobin3]

Previous CAD experience

  Software I have currently used is Inventor,Auto cad,Auto cad mechanical & also Fusion 360.
  And i did all the projects in Inventor & Fusion 360.

What do you typically model / design?

  Mold design,core & cavity,making industrial projects.

What about the technology preview got your interest?

  I'm very interested in reviewing the new sheet metal features.
  I'm always looking for new things that I can learn.

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

  It will definitely give me a great knowledge about the fusion 360 sheet metal workflows.
  It will also help me to do my future projects in sheet metal in fusion 360 itself.

Looking forward for your positive reply

R.ROBINSON CHARLY
Application Engineer
+91 93822 49441
charlyrobin3@gmail.com

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I'm Arun , working as Application Engineer in USAM CADSOFT .

Previous CAD experience.

My previous experience was on Solid works, now currently working on FDS(Factory Design Suite) Products, Mainly focused on products like Inventor , AutoCAD Mechanical and Fusion 360. I give product demos to customers and give solutions based on the features .

What do you typically model / design?

Since my nature of work place is an industrial based area which consist of different types of large to small scale industries, I work on different projects which lists Mould designing, Machinery Designing , sheet metal works and weldment works (Frame designing). So, typically I work on most of the CAD region.

What about the technology preview got your interest?

As said earlier " I give product demos to customers" , so in order to promote the product and personally I have a huge craze on sheet metal designing , I have worked on both Solidworks and Inventor sheet metal.   So thought of trying out Fusion 360 sheet metal and give suggestion to make it grow .

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

This will improve my knowledge . And, I can get a detailed judgement of products and their capabilities to position the product for the customer requirement.

Hope this will help you to know about my thoughts regarding the product.

Regards,

Arun Kumar T

Application Engineer,

+91 93822 49444

arun@usam.in

[mcramblet]

• Previous CAD experience.

Rhino (with T-Splines), Evolve, MoI, and, of course Fusion 360. Throw in a little ZBrush and Blender to supplement CAD.

• What do you typically model / design?

I work for a packaging company, where the majority of work I do is creating thermoformed packaging and containers. We are very big into thermoformed food containers, but also design and manufacturer all types of general retail packaging.

• What about the technology preview got your interest?

Sheet metal functionality

• How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow?

I was originally interested in trying out the sheet metal tools on all manner of folding carton work, that is used in retail packaging. The bends and folds of carton work has always been problematic in CAD. The sheet metal tools seem like it would be a natural to use for this type of work, where dielines are often generated in 2D CAD programs and then need to be converted into 3D to render the concepts. With some of the other uses I've seen using the sheet metal tools, I can see it very useful in projecting details onto thermoformed designs.

I currently still rely on Rhino when it comes to paperboard/folding cartons, as I find manually creating folded packaging easier, with its set of tools. If the sheet metal tools work as I think they will, this would allow me to stay within Fusion 360 and make it so much easier.

[pjreijiri]

Hello, I have worked with inventor for 4 years and have been a Fusion 360 user for a year. 

Usually I model consumer product, with some industrial machines and assembly.

I enjoy every new update by Fusion 360 and I want to help fellow engineers be able to use more and more features. I want to help the autodesk community with my time and experience.

Every time a new feature is released it makes it easier to finish my projects with shorter times. There has never been a useless function in Fusion 360 so far. 

[prem]

Previous CAD experience

I have been working on Multiple CAD Platforms for about 15 years now, including Solidworks, Solidege, NX, CATIA and Inventor. Currently, I am employed as Tech Sales and Support representative for Autodesk MFG Solutions with a reseller in India

What do you typically model / design?

I typical address issues in MFG industry, which includes machinery design, control panels, Automotive Stamping Components, Jigs and Fixture Design

What about the technology preview got your interest?

We have been positioning Fusion 360 as the next CAD/CAM/CAE Solution, though many of our customers were interested in the Sheetmetal Module, I understand that this is still under testing.I can give some functional requirements that our customers have addressed as a day to day problem with their existing CAD packages, this might help make Fusion Sheetmetal more functional in real-time industrial applications

How do you believe the feature / function that is being previewed will improve your workflow

As i am addressing Solutions for Control Panel Manufacturers, these are more of Sheet Metal Fabricated components and we see Fusion 360 with Sheet Metal could be an very good option for them.