I’m starting to get more interested in building more complex things, but am unsure how to plan out my ideas. Is there a good source on drafting/planning designs? I honestly have no idea where to start.
If you are planning 3D designs, Fusion360 takes a bit of getting used to but is extremely powerful.
https://www.autodesk.com/products/fusion-360/
You can register for a free hobby license for the scaled down version, or a free educational license of the full version. It has good CAD capabilities and on the CAM side can generate g-code for 3D printing and CNC, or else allow you to export STL models direct to a slicer.
…plan
…yep, maybe that is what I’ve been missing…
I’ve used sketchup in the past, and it works great, but for more recent projects I’ve moved over to blender.
I don’t go into crazy details for projects, so mainly I just need real world measurements and units, and the ability for my wife to be able to visualize the project as a whole. She usually designs everything and I just make it work.
What helps me to do a project efficiently is to focus on limitations first: be it the budget, size, materials or tools. If I have the everything ready to create a prototype right off the bat, I do it and iterate on mistakes.
This structures my mind and makes creation process to be more challenging/rewarding
