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Autodesk Inventor --  1 -- 
3/25
I am looking to integrate Inventor with our current Microvellum software, hoping the addition will allow us to be more effective. We use MV for standard library item production, and plan to use Inventor for our more complicated "custom" products. Our product mix over the last 18 months and next 6 months is about 50% standard product and 50% custom. We have struggled using Microvellum to develop custom products. Basically, we bypass it, instead using AutoCad soley to develop these products. I feel that Inventor offers more capability to do this, after becoming proficient in it of course. Does anyone currently use Inventor and what has your experience been?
3/26 #2: Autodesk Inventor ...
One question is what is custom for your shop as that varies widely from shop to shop?
As for inventor I have used it for some drawing and it works fairly well. Though the parametric part of inventor is a big plus over AutoCad. Inventor is quite different than AutoCad and would take some time to learn. Another issue is getting the information (parts list, cnc drawings) out of inventor that you will need for production. There are some programs to assist with this.
Personally, we still do most of our work with AutoCad, primarily drawing in 3d and use Smartlister to add and extract part information. I have found this is our best solution for custom products.
3/26 #3: Autodesk Inventor ...
I agree with Dan, inventor will do a nice job of producing 3d models that you can export steps files with. There will be a learning curve. My only question is that isn't MV capable of doing that as well? I don't know much about it but I keep hearing from the few people that actually like it, say it is the only software you will ever need.
3/26 #4: Autodesk Inventor ...
Website: http://www.cadcode.com
Lots of shops would like to use Inventor as their primary design program because of its many strengths when compared to 2D modeling (as in AutoCAD). The hang up remains, as Dan pointed out, reliably, consistently, and painlessly (relatively speaking) getting the information out of Inventor to actually make your products.
9/12 #5: Autodesk Inventor ...
Website: http://www.hitechcaddservices.com
I fairly agree with Dan.
Inventor is very user-friendly. It offers self-updating for various features that are missing in AutoCAD. And one of the greatest features of Inventor is that it doesn’t use layers, or a command line, or a UCSISON. It also provides easy data integration and configuration.
Additionally, the Autodesk Inventor is an indispensable and prime choice for professional carpenters and woodwork designers.
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