Thinking about assemblies

[SteveS]

So - I'm still working my way through a lot of tutorial videos. Continually impressed with 1) how powerful FreeCAD is, and 2) how it seems to be much more intuitive than Fusion 360. I'm sure Fusion has some esoteric features that FreeCAD lacks, but given my level of expertise, FreeCAD is going to be the bees knees.

Anyway, looking to start extending myself with stuff relevant to my own projects and would appreciate some guidance on assemblies. Not sure if I'm going to go at it using Std_Part or maybe using Assembly4, but would like to get some pointers into other tutorials (video or otherwise) or even some topics within the documentation that might be helpful.

Specifically, I'm thinking of a part that represents a drawer side (or a drawer front, or back or...) The basic shape is the same, but depending on how it is used within the final assembly, the size - length, depth etc. - will vary. Also, the sides, front & back are assembled into a drawer, then each drawer is assembled with other parts into the final cabinet. So I'm seeing at least two levels of containership here, one that assembles the drawer components into a drawer, and another that then assembles the drawers with other components into a finished piece. Dimensions all of the individual drawer components are parametrically driven with spreadsheets.

I can just bull ahead and do this my way and stumble and fall (which I'll be sure to do anyway! ) but let me know if there are any tutorials on this or any Knowledge Base articles that might help me understand the work flow.

Thanks!

[vocx]

... So I'm seeing at least two levels of containership here, one that assembles the drawer components into a drawer, and another that then assembles the drawers with other components into a finished piece...

This is exactly the workflow of an assembly workbench in a traditional CAD system. You create the final assembly from subassemblies; you nest a Std_Part inside another Std_Part. Look for examples and tutorials for Assembly3 and Assembly4. They are exactly designed to do this.

[chrisb]

Moved from Open discussion.

[SteveS]

This is exactly the workflow of an assembly workbench in a traditional CAD system. You create the final assembly from subassemblies; you nest a Std_Part inside another Std_Part. Look for examples and tutorials for Assembly3 and Assembly4. They are exactly designed to do this.

Great. Thanks. Viewed a tutorial on Assembly4 the other day, but have yet to work through it. I’ll find others on that and Assembly3 and work through those. Would it be worthwhile to seek out a tutorial on creating assemblies without invoking a workbench (is that a thing?)

[vocx]

... creating assemblies without invoking a workbench (is that a thing?)

Dude, I already mentioned it several times. You can create "manual" assemblies. Just move different objects in 3D space; there is no tutorial for that, it's just changing the Placement of the objects until they are in the position that you want (use Std_Placement).

See the User showcase subforum, there are various threads that show different assemblies. Some of them are created manually, others with Assembly workbenches.

[SteveS]

Ok. Got it. Thanks!