Inventor or Creo?

[kgargiulo]

Disclosure up front: I work for PTC. The opinions below are my own, not PTC's.

You can download all the free PTC software and free training if you start at http://www.ptc.com/go/first

PTC is a huge sponsor of FIRST (sponsoring dozens of teams, the annual Kick Off, many regionals, and FIRST at a corporate level). Hundreds of our employees volunteer with FIRST. I say that just to give credence to the fact that we're not just throwing some software out there and hoping people use it. The company is firmly behind FIRST's mission.

I believe PTC provides FIRST teams with the most comprehensive set of free design and data management software and training that you can get. That said, I hope every team looks at all the options out there and picks the best one for them. As you are doing so, I suggest you look not just at the software functionality, but also at the job postings in your area from product development engineering firms and consider the specific CAD skills that are in demand in your area.

PTC provides Creo, Mathcad, Windchill, and Internet of Things software platform access for free and has for many years (IoT is new this year). We also provide the field and KOP models each year for free (http://www.ptc.com/go/firstkop).

Future teaser - I'd expect future games to start to include aspects that are specifically oriented around IoT. Maybe not next year, but I'll be very surprised if the game design committee isn't looking in that direction. I have no insider information, just my prediction.

Creo invented 3D parametric solid modeling, but besides everything you expect from solid modeling you also get mechanism design and analysis, automated drawing creation, automated BOM generation, photorendering, and quite a few other modules.

Mathcad allows engineering calculations to be performed, documented, and even linked to drive your CAD models.

Windchill is fully integrated with Creo (you run it in Creo, within the same interface, or can also run it in any browser). Windchill manages all the CAD content so you can avoid shuttling thumb drives around and having people lose files or step on each others changes. Generating CAD files is easy. Keeping them in synch manually is guaranteed to fall apart if you are reaching any reasonable degree of model complexity.

Windchill handles backup and is accessible anywhere there is an internet connection. People who don't have Creo but who want or need to see the model (and measure or otherwise interrogate it) can use Creo View as a very lightweight and easy to use interface to see the full 3d model and get information from it. You control access for your team, and can store and iterate whatever electronic file you wish in your project.

PTC provides FIRST teams access to all of its on line training for those software packages, hosts a multi-week webinar where PTC experts lead you though the "How to Model Almost Anything" training (Sept to Nov each year), and finally PTC also offers live and video conference training workshops scheduled with individual teams.

All of this software and training is exactly the same as PTC provides to its commercial clients, except where we added more that is unique to FIRST. Oh, and its all free for FIRST teams.

Our team has had tremendous success using Creo, Creo View, Windchill, and (admittedly to a lesser extent) Mathcad.

I am not seeking to start a posting war over which CAD is better. OK, I will say that if SolidWorks is actually charging FIRST teams for their licenses (I've read posts that say they do, and others that say they don't) then I don't understand why there isn't a mass revolt against them (we'll welcome you to Creo any time!). In any case, our team is very confident in our decision and the benefits we get from it every day. Your mileage may vary. I hope the information here helps, whether anyone chooses PTC / Creo or not.

[OccamzRazor]

Originally Posted by kgargiulo

I am not seeking to start a posting war over which CAD is better. OK, I will say that if SolidWorks is actually charging FIRST teams for their licenses (I've read posts that say they do, and others that say they don't) then I don't understand why there isn't a mass revolt against them (we'll welcome you to Creo any time!). In any case, our team is very confident in our decision and the benefits we get from it every day. Your mileage may vary. I hope the information here helps, whether anyone chooses PTC / Creo or not.

Just to put this part to rest, 3506 has had 30 seats of SOLIDWORKS Student Edition for 5 years straight now and we have not paid a dime. SW is free for all FRC teams so do not discount it as an option.

As for version control and external references, using a data management software such as (free) GrabCAD Workbench would alleviate a lot of those grievances. I am hoping that EPDM will be included in the next license handout from FIRST and SOLIDWORKS because that would be even better.

As for CAD platforms I found that functionally CREO and SOLIDWORKS are very comparable while Inventor does not quite have as many features. SOLIDWORKS of course boasts ease-of-use more than anything else which I found much easier to teach to high school students. I work in the CAD industry and I can say there is no such thing as an unbiased opinion on these programs and that any head to head comparison is biased.

My bias lies with SOLIDWORKS but with that being said you can always change programs and learn something new. I would use the resources at your disposal and make the software decision based on what mentors are available that know the programs, what teaching resources you have access to on the web, and any literature such as a CAD manual from a course.

[JustinCAD]

Inventor is the most preferred program on our team, due to our experience with it. As others have stated, Inventor seems to have an easy-to-learn design. Personally, I don't know anything about Creo, though I would like to learn in the future. We have a new student joining our CAD subteam who knows the basics of SolidWorks, and he may be able to help us with it. Overall, Inventor is currently my most favored software.

[Sperkowsky]

We have used sketchup for the last few years..... Next year we intend to use solid works but we shall see.

[sanddrag]

If anyone from Autodesk is reading, PLEASE we need cloud-based Vault. We love vault currently, but some things are a real pain. It's a real love hate relationship.

We might be looking into using 360, but I'm not very familiar with it yet. Does it maintain similar functionality to Vault with revision history and check in and check out?

[inventor_phild]

Based on discussions with other teams I have posted this question to the Vault development team.

My guess is that the answer is A360.

[MrRoboSteve]

Originally Posted by inventor_phild

Based on discussions with other teams I have posted this question to the Vault development team.

My guess is that the answer is A360.

3081 used A360 this year for multi user design and it generally worked well.

[Michael Hill]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

If anyone from Autodesk is reading, PLEASE we need cloud-based Vault. We love vault currently, but some things are a real pain. It's a real love hate relationship.

We might be looking into using 360, but I'm not very familiar with it yet. Does it maintain similar functionality to Vault with revision history and check in and check out?

Perhaps I'm wrong about this, but can't Windchill handle non-Creo CAD systems? I've never used it myself, but that was my understanding when watching some videos about it.

[kgargiulo]

Originally Posted by Michael Hill

Perhaps I'm wrong about this, but can't Windchill handle non-Creo CAD systems? I've never used it myself, but that was my understanding when watching some videos about it.

Yes, Windchill can manage the CAD for anything that I've ever seen any FIRST team use and more.

Windchill Multi-CAD management

AutoCAD, Inventor, CATIA V5, SoildWorks, NX, FORAN, ECAD, and Cadence can all be managed in their native file format. For that matter, you can open (and change if you want) most (maybe all, I haven't checked recently) of them in their native format in Creo.

There is also a wide range of viewer support.

Using viewers so non-CAD team members can see the model in 3D without all the overhead of learning CAD is an underrated thing. This year our team permanently had a Creo View session running in the main fabrication shop. If someone's print wasn't clear they went to the model and measured directly off the model to clear up confusion - or to find out we had a design problem.

[deheer_j]

I would love to use Windchill with Inventor, but I could not find how to get the latest version of Windchill to talk with Inventor 2015.

below is what Windchill is saying I have available. In the old version of windchill, there was a plugin available for other software. Any idea how to install the plug for Inventor 2015?

Software Downloads

Document Management Windchill DTI Help
Install this application to access common Windchill actions with Microsoft Office and Windows Explorer.
- Windchill Desktop Integration (32-bit)
- Windchill Desktop Integration (64-bit)

Project Management Microsoft Project Plugin Help
Install this application to exchange plan information between Windchill ProjectLink and Microsoft Project.
- PTC Plug-in for Microsoft Project

Setup and Installation Setup and Installation Help
If your network does not allow Windchill applets to communicate with Windchill servers, this package will provide alternative means to do so. Please contact your IT department for assistance and to determine if this is necessary.
- Bootstrap Loader Installation

Visualization Visualization Help
Install this application to view, markup, review and collaborate on MCAD/ECAD product data and documents.
- Creo View Installation

[kgargiulo]

The word group manager software for Inventor is apparently not bundled with the free Windchill instance that gas been set up for FIRST teams. I am checking with PTC to see if that could change, but unless I post something to the contrary here that seems to be a restriction that is going to stay in place.

[Sperkowsky]

2869 has used sketchup for years. It's nice to organize thoughts quickly but thats all its good for.

This year we decided to learn inventor. I have a basic understanding already. We are making a off season bot so we will see if it's all worth it