Designing Chassis, what program?

[Mastervolume]

I want to have some chassis built to my specs and wondered if you guys have any recommendations on a good program to use for design?

TIA

[oldhousescott]

OpenOffice.org's Draw is a free vector-graphics program similar to CorelDraw. I've used it for designing faceplates. Doing a chassis shouldn't be much harder.

[Mastervolume]

thanks!

will that do pdf?

[mlp-mx6]

Download CutePDF and EVERYTHING can then print PDF.

[drz400]

I want to have some chassis built to my specs and wondered if you guys have any recommendations on a good program to use for design?

TIA

Solidworks if you have the money
Rhino3D if you are on a budget
Any CAD program will do but if you dont know what you are doing in supplying proper prints you are better off getting someone who does have something like SolidWorks do it for you. That is my job actually so if you have something you need and it isnt too complicated I will wack it out for you no charge.
Just email me mogeen@NOSPAMverizon.net remove NOSPAM

[paulster]

Any CAD program will do but if you dont know what you are doing in supplying proper prints you are better off getting someone who does have something like SolidWorks do it for you.

I'll add a +1 for this reasoning. I decided that I'd do my own designs for chassis, faceplates, etc. in CorelDraw since I've had years of experience with it, and it was still a pain.

It's way harder in 2D to ensure that you've got a proper fit for everything inside the chassis, as you've got to worry about whether things like jack sockets on the front panel will hit your boards, and whether you can practically screw the boards in once you've mounted the transformers.

Once you've worked round that then you still need quality files to use for manufacturing, unless they are going to re-draw your plans.

This is where I discovered that the DXF/DWG export in Corel has seemingly always had a few known bugs leading to certain holes not getting laser cut even though they were visible within the laser cutting software. For reference, DXFTool sorted that particular one out.

You can do it, but it's probably quicker and easier to give it to an expert unless you're really prepared for the learning curve.