Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

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zohozer
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by zohozer »

Kunda1 wrote: Sat Feb 29, 2020 11:57 pm Perhaps anyone inspired by this: https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=43781 'New Feature: Notch Connector'
Thank you for the heads-up. This will be more suited into a "Wood-Frame" workbench.

Seems that here it is a confusion between Carpentry and Joinery. They are similar and quite different into the same time. Furniture it is more related to joinery.

Anyway, how it is going this project. It is some developers interested to start this project? We are discussing this for a lot of time now, but seems that nothing really moves!

I think a good start will be to have a tool to insert cams between two different panels. With option to remove or change them as needed.

A good starting tutorial will be this: TopSolid' Wood | In Place Design. It would be great to have such tools to work with in FreeCAD.

And here it is a SOLIDWORKS in the furniture design industry. SolidWorks also have a specialised add-on called SWood that can automate a lot the generation of the shop drawings and g-code files for CNC machines.
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WayofWood
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by WayofWood »

Kunda1 wrote: Sat Feb 29, 2020 11:57 pm Perhaps anyone inspired by this: https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=43781 'New Feature: Notch Connector'
Interesting feature. It might be worthwhile to see if the identical functionality of the LC interlocking workbench could be merged with this ...
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christi
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by christi »

The Wood-Frame workbench seems to be in an early stage of development. You cannot even install it via the addon manager.

And yeah, the crosspiece tool in the LC interlocking workbench is doing nearly the same than my tool is doing, it has even more features. But I think it is not a good design practice to include the width of a cutting tool into the design. This is why I do not really like the LC interlocking workbench.
zohozer
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by zohozer »

Just seen this presentation of the Feature Patterns with Lattice2 Workbench.

Can this be adapted to insert cams and fixtures? Like in this video demonstration on how to create "Smart Components" in SolidWorks
zohozer
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by zohozer »

A kitchen designed entirely in FreeCAD: FreeCAD - My Kitchen
routalot
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by routalot »

I know this thread is originally quite old and has seen sporadic interest over the years,but has everybody lost interest?Or is it just too difficult to make the next steps?I have had some success with modelling basic rectangular carcases by assembling the individual parts in the A2plus assembler. I have tried to use the spreadsheet workbench to give the various panels the features needed,but can't see a way to link the various spreadsheets to one master sheet that governs all parts.I suspect those with more experience of OLE documents would get further.

I value the ability to look closely at all the features to make sure that everything aligns and then would like the ability to combine the individual panels in one place for CNC machining.I have discovered the well concealed Panels-Nest function and initially was quite excited at finding it.It is so close to being really useful and it seems to have a lot of potential.The downside is that it doesn't seem to have the facility to define the space between parts and with the possible exception of laser cutting,there is always some amount of room required for a cut.Is anything under development for this particular step?It would add to the number of things I can do with Freecad and it seems that many on this thread could benefit also,even if the first step was limited to simple rectangular components.

The other thing that is puzzling me is that the export pdf feature,which is really helpful to show a design or email it to somebody, doesn't seem to allow the possibility of a landscape format.Has anybody found a way to achieve this?

We seem to have most of the individual components somewhere in the Freecad ecosystem and it is tantalisingly close to being a phenomenal piece of software,if only a few links fall into place.I wish I knew enough about coding to help with creating those links.
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onekk
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by onekk »

Hello,

Here some ideas.
routalot wrote: Mon Feb 14, 2022 10:57 am I value the ability to look closely at all the features to make sure that everything aligns and then would like the ability to combine the individual panels in one place for CNC machining.I have discovered the well concealed Panels-Nest function and initially was quite excited at finding it.It is so close to being really useful and it seems to have a lot of potential.The downside is that it doesn't seem to have the facility to define the space between parts and with the possible exception of laser cutting,there is always some amount of room required for a cut.Is anything under development for this particular step?It would add to the number of things I can do with Freecad and it seems that many on this thread could benefit also,even if the first step was limited to simple rectangular components.
It is not trivial to create CNC output, as there are some problem, but it is feasible, with some work on coding , and some testing.

Problem is that for each part you have to create operations to make them, and some operations involve some grade of manual intervention, like rotating the panel by hand and align properly to machine right things in right places. (I'm assuming that this work has to be done with a relatively simple hobby machine, and not a dedicated machine with automatic ways, of machining a panel both sides).

For the Assembly Part, problems are to position parts, but this is not a real problem, as in code you could everything you want, providing some "sane placement defaults" moving and object in place, is simply a matter to calculate his relative position on the space.

as example if you set lower left, botttom front, corner of the cabinet "shoulder" every panel will be positioned at the right place, based on some calculations using panels parameters, of which you have to know exact positions, if you place al the component with lower left corner in origin, it is only a matter of concatenating rotation and position.

Putting them in a part compound, as they are components, they have to not overlap each others, adding some 0.001mm allowance between parts usually will do the trick, and they seems to be touching, but they are not overlapping.

A part compound then could be moved as a whole thing.
routalot wrote: Mon Feb 14, 2022 10:57 am The other thing that is puzzling me is that the export pdf feature,which is really helpful to show a design or email it to somebody, doesn't seem to allow the possibility of a landscape format.Has anybody found a way to achieve this?
Maybe using some TechDraw sheet will help, a 3d modeler is not created to export a 3d object in a 2d world.

It has to be investigated if maybe there is some "scenegraph" to image converter for Pivy, and then th eimage could be put in a pdf file.

Regards

Carlo D.
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zohozer
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by zohozer »

routalot wrote: Mon Feb 14, 2022 10:57 am I know this thread is originally quite old and has seen sporadic interest over the years,but has everybody lost interest?
Personally I dind't lost the interest in this project, the only problem is that we need a serious developer to put all the pieces together and for now I didn't find anyone interested.

There are some development going on like this Woodworking - getDimensions but also needs more attention like the implementation of a GRAIN direction for panels "Annotate" a face or an element., grain direction, that we are waiting for a developer to pick-up and implement this feature.

We already have a Spreadsheet workbench who is quite capable and there also it is developed a Configuration Table using Spreadsheet that needs some further improvements like the posibility to use IF, ELSE conditionals.

Personally I am not a programmer so I can help only with ideeas, testing and money if needed.
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yorik
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by yorik »

You know, I think mounting a well-structured, doable plan with well thought and well described features, is maybe 60% of the work. Once that is done, coding is easy and I would even dare to say it won't require finding a developer, one person will start, another will go further, etc...

We could try to start a plan here. I have a very limited idea of what an ideal furniture workbench should be, but let's start with something.

- modelling workflow:

- work with boxes
- be able to assemble those boxes
- be able to drive the boxes dimensions from a spreadsheet
- be able to subdivide boxes
- generate panels from those boxes
- generate specific attachment points from these panels
- those attachment points can become holes, or be use to hook other objects (screws, hinges, buttons, whatever)

- production workflow:

- be able o generate CNC cut sheets
- be able to generate BOM
- be able o generate conventional drawings (plan, front view...)
- be able to generate exploded drawings

Once this plan is good, the next step would be to identify which new features/objects are needed, and which existing ones can be used or need to be adapted
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onekk
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Re: Cabinet furniture design tools workbench

Post by onekk »

yorik wrote: Wed Feb 16, 2022 11:03 am You know, I think mounting a well-structured, doable plan with well thought and well described features, is maybe 60% of the work. Once that is done, coding is easy and I would even dare to say it won't require finding a developer, one person will start, another will go further, etc...

We could try to start a plan here. I have a very limited idea of what an ideal furniture workbench should be, but let's start with something.

- modelling workflow:

- work with boxes
- be able to assemble those boxes
- be able to drive the boxes dimensions from a spreadsheet
- be able to subdivide boxes
- generate panels from those boxes
- generate specific attachment points from these panels
- those attachment points can become holes, or be use to hook other objects (screws, hinges, buttons, whatever)

- production workflow:

- be able o generate CNC cut sheets
- be able to generate BOM
- be able o generate conventional drawings (plan, front view...)
- be able to generate exploded drawings

Once this plan is good, the next step would be to identify which new features/objects are needed, and which existing ones can be used or need to be adapted
Good outline, @yorik

I have done something similar, but the key points are not easily feasible, as something in the infrastrucutre is lacking.

I've some doubt that the whole thing could be driven from a spreadhseet, as in such things, some level of abstraction is needed, in a similar work (and in other ones) I've resolved to use as a "storage container" a simple .ini file, that could solve some problems.
  • Drive module creation as some lenghts could hardcoded and reused a lot.
  • Data storage for reusability of projects, a single text file could hold an entire set of cabinet, if correctly taylored.
  • Serve as easy way to input things, instead of fiddling with a GUI interface you simply could edit with a text editor the file.
  • With some techniques "accurately taylored" it could even drive the creation of the GUI to visualize and eventualy modify "generation data".
What I've not been able to do is some "technical drawings" and some "GCode generation", but mainly because the "customer" was satisfied with the "test product", and decide to make the subsequents phases, by hand.

Speaking of GCode production, I have another personal project that is able to generate Gcode, but sadly I have my CNC "on repair" so I con't do some further testing.

What is lacking is "the glue" but "the glue" is not very difficult to make, it is not a simple Macro, as it is more than 10.000 lines of code, GUI and drawing generation to be passed as DXF to an external CAM program to feed the CNC with proper GCode.

Actually there are no "blocking points" a part for some TechDrawing Scriptability" and some improvements that has to be made to "PathScript Scriptability" to obtain a more smooth GCode generation.

Math is not so difficult to do as at the very end you are speaking of boxes and the most complicated part is to plan all the "plays between parts", and have some "sane conventions" when building "components".

A cabinet, is composed by five parts, two "shoulders" 1 top, 1 bottom, and a Rear, you have to decide how to joint the top and bottom with the two shoulders and how to model the rear.

A demo of a cabinet with some drawers
cabinet.png
cabinet.png (8.43 KiB) Viewed 1823 times
One "component" outline ready to be exported as DXF.
drafts.png
drafts.png (5.89 KiB) Viewed 1823 times
Some Path generated using Scripting for another project

An automatically generated GUI, without use of Qt designer or other complex things.
GUI-new.png
GUI-new.png (50.88 KiB) Viewed 1823 times
Sadlly most of the code is copyrighted and not reusable.

Regards

Carlo D.



paths.png
paths.png (35.89 KiB) Viewed 1823 times
GitHub page: https://github.com/onekk/freecad-doc.
- In deep articles on FreeCAD.
- Learning how to model with scripting.
- Various other stuffs.

Blog: https://okkmkblog.wordpress.com/
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