I’m debating against this and Inventor, although Inventor seems more globally used among the VEX Community.
Are there any pros or cons for using Fusion over Inventor? Thanks.
(i,e; does it have 3d model libraries for VEX parts, etc.)
tbh I think it comes down to preference. I prefer inventor, but if you like using fusion better you should go with that. but I would say inventor tends to have the most support as it is the most commonly used.
Please see the plethora of existing threads about this topic.
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I use fusion because I have to (I’m on Mac) and I’d say it’s not super vex friendly at all lol. The parts don’t “mate” and you have to manually align everything, or make your own mating parts. It’s tedious to say the least. If you have the choice, just use Inventor. But if you don’t, then fusion 360 works just fine.
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Yes, fusion is much less demanding on your computer than inventor. However, inventor is better to use for CADing in my opinion.
Like @mvas , we use Fusion 360 because we’re on Macs. It also shares very well between multiple users, though that may be true of others, too.
I don’t have an issue with mating things. Throw a circle in a hole, put a dot in its center, erase the circle, and copy the dot to the other holes. It takes a little while, but then you save these versions to use, and you don’t have to do it again.
I personally use inventor because I am on Windows and I was taught inventor in school.
I would look and see if your courses in school have anything that might help determine what you put time in learning. Last time I checked PLTW was Autodesk Inventor for most schools, and for my university they ended up being an Autodesk school which worked out very nicely.
I found the attached video very helpful for getting started to cad in fusion.
Really, it depends on what you know how to do. If you’re experienced in Fusion 360, use that. If you know Inventor well, than go with inventor. I use SolidWorks because its the CAD software I know best. Really, its all up to preference, but if you dont already know a CAD software, I’d go with inventor since it’s widely used. The current Vex Solidworks library is also pretty old (2012) and has a lot of issues at the moment.
This paper has information on about the various CAD options, and also links to parts libraries. CAD for VEX Robotics.pdf (199.4 KB)
Inventor would probably be better if you have Frontier internet, as Fusion is cloud based.
I am a huge proponent of Fusion 360 and definitely think it is a great option for your situation. I made a tutorial on the basics of it on YouTube. https://youtu.be/S6OUkn2Cksg. Let me know if it helps you.