Software for gear design?

[Sebastian Finke]

I love how he threw out a $3000 software program to make simple gears. Lol

Actually I threw out a $50 program...

[zx81]

I see no one has mentioned Google Sketchup there is a free plugin for doing gears

[TimM]

Thanks for the suggestions! I have (at least for now) settled on OpenSCAD, because its programming approach appeals to me, a professional programmer! The MCAD library for OpenSCAD contains an excellent gear design module.

I do note that Sketchup is slammed by a lot of users for producing buggy STL files. In fact, one of the manufacturers of 3D printers that I was looking at specifically advised against trying to print Sketchup files on their printers.

Tim

[zx81]

I learnt how to use sketchup a long while ago before I had a 3d printer so if i want to do something quickly i usually just use sketchup, you have to use a plugin to export stl files ..I find it's more likley to be badly designed models .. using x ray mode and checking that things are solid and removing unwanted lines helps a huge amount. I've been toying with openscad. I like it but i can just do things faster with sketchup (and i'm not shelling out £100's or even £1000's for software). I really should spend more time using openscad its very handy for making adaptable parts that's for sure.

[bbinnard]

You can also use Rhino3D and Grasshopper to do parametric designs. Grasshopper uses a graphical UI instead of code which I like better.

[Marm]

The sketchup plugin is nice, and most here know I'm at the front of the pack carrying the sketchup banner, but the files that Roxy et al have suggested are hands down far superior to anything sketchup can do. It was the first thing that popped in my mind.

[Sebastian Finke]

You can also use Rhino3D and Grasshopper to do parametric designs. Grasshopper uses a graphical UI instead of code which I like better.

Rhino isn't parametric

[bbinnard]

But the grasshopper free add-on is. It is the only thing I use for making parametric models.

[pjeran]

If you are just looking for gears, Gearotic it the best I have seen. All sorts of gear types and if you are looking beyond gears and into mechanisms, there are a number of escapements and the like. Art, the creator of the program is the same one that created the Mach series of PC based CNC controllers. He updates the code frequently and is always responsive to new feature requests.

Gearotic.com