# drawing aid vs using cad



## woodman12 (Feb 12, 2012)

handy for people who are not good at cad---diagram to dxf to the cnc 


guitar body from tracing - YouTube drawiing aid

This portable drawing aid is great ,I have used it with cnc router/spindle or cnc co2 laser.
I do not spend enough time with a cad program to become good at it ,so i use this drawing aid and with a small amount of tries
it was worked for me .Its not real cheap around 1400,00 US funds but its easy to use and you can copy parts also
i have included a gasket i traced to cut on the 100 watt laser

copying and cutting an old gasket - YouTube
If there is any interest i can steer you to the source,the guys name is john walsh and he's excellent to deal with
i also have a draw program that i can trace from a monitor screen and a draw program for doing soemthing large like 6 feet long
called combine ,its stiches a bunch of small diagrams to make one large *.dxf file


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## JOAT (Apr 9, 2010)

This is advanced as I get. Works for me.


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## woodman12 (Feb 12, 2012)

That is not so simple ,you are able to draw a diagram and then get it into a vector format and then produce the gcode for a cnc machine.
You are doing Ok and don't need any drawing aid to get it into a dxf format


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## JOAT (Apr 9, 2010)

woodman12 said:


> That is not so simple ,you are able to draw a diagram and then get it into a vector format and then produce the gcode for a cnc machine.
> You are doing Ok and don't need any drawing aid to get it into a dxf format


:haha: Yep, for me it is so simple. I freehand sketch a design I like, lay it out on graph paper to get the dimensions, then lay it out on a piece of plywood for a pattern, cut it out, glue it to a second piece of plywood, then when the glue is dry, rout using the first piece as a template. That gives me my master. Then I nail it to the piece I want to form, and rout; repeat as desired, for duplicate, accurate, copies. No CNC involved. I'm way too broke to afford any CNC machines, and doubt I'd buy any if I could. That would take all the enjoyment out of it for me. I can buy a lot of wood for $1400. I don't know what a what vector or dxf formats are, and don't care. :no:


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