Learning Fusion 360

I recently acquired the "Startup" Fusion 360 license for my shop since I make under $100k a year with my business.

Throughout college I spent a lot of time learning SolidWorks and Mastercam as well some use with AutoCAD/Inventor. I wish I could afford a seat of SolidWorks right now because I consider myself pretty fluent with it, but that is simply out of the question at this time.

I've only spent a few hours playing around with Fusion 360 the past week or so but I can see that there are some obvious differences from the 3D packages I'm most familiar with.

Rather than starting from scratch and just playing around until I become familiar with the features and commands, what do you Fusion 360 guys recommend I do in order to quickly get up to speed with the software?

I see there are tons of tutorial videos on YouTube and Udemy which I think might be helpful. Has anyone bought any books on Fusion 360 and actually learned through them? That's how most of my classes in college were taught...with the $250 textbooks.

I learned Fusion 360 by following Autodesk's videos step by step, by using F360 and making mistakes, and going to the F360 user forums for answers. For me, there is no substitute for diving in and using practically any software (or tool or machine), and learning from my mistakes.

If I am not mistaken Fusion 360 was being discussed not too long ago on this forum.
If you do a search here, some of your questions may be answered.
Dave

The best thing I did to learn Fusion was this 8 hour free course. I did this 3 years ago so I am not sure how relevant it will be to the current Fusion but it is worth taking a look at, hopefully, it is still free.

The Fusion 360 Youtube channel is a wealth of info as well.

I really like the the Autodesk Fusion webinars they've recently done. Check out the one Rob Lockwood did. He talks about some fundamental CAM stuff that applies to most any CAM program. He has his own Youtube channel too with great CAM content.

It's amazing how much free and great information you can get on Youtube now days. Not that long ago you'd have to pay $1000+ dollars to take a fuckin cad/cam class.

How to learn? Open the program and start using it. When you hit a roadblock, open up Chrome and tell it what problem you are having. I guarantee there is somebody who has already hit the same snag and had their question answered on the Fusion forum.

TONS of videos on youtube with some very good CAD/CAM instructionals as well. Lars Christensen has a lot of beginner material. He goes extremely (frustratingly) slow, but it's good for beginners.

As mentioned in Dave K's thread, NYCNC on youtube has quite a lot of videos on using Fusion 360 for CAD and CAM.

I really like his videos because hes new enough to it to make all the same mistakes I do, but at the same time he knows enough to work through what he did wrong.

You get far more practical info than just the Autodesk guy telling you to do this or that.

There are a few videos of Autodesk people just dweebing around that I find extremely informative since they know how the software is meant to be used. When I was new to Fusion I had a hard time learning enough to be able to start learning how to use it, I couldn't get over that hump. If it wasn't for igetit.com I don't know if I would be using Fusion now. It was perfect for giving me that foundation on which to build. I think Autodesk needs to develop some structured learning material to teach how to use Fusion to those who are new to it, but I have been saying this for years. Just opening up the program and trying to learning through trial and error is a HUGE waste of time.

Do such textbooks exist? I've yet to see anything of the like, but haven't looked either. Your situation is somewhat similar to mine; small CNC machining facility, came into the family business in 1989 with a Fadal 4020 and a copy of (at the time) Bridgeport's "EZ-CAM" all in one CAD/CAM system.....straight up outa 1989, yo! A little later in life i stumbled across Solidworks for my CAD needs; and fell head over heels in love! It was the best thing since sliced bread, and I knew it like the back of my hand, in no time.
The CAM experience went a little crazy; you name it, I tried it. In the event I didn't purchase a seat out-right; I had plenty of friends in the business that would let me test drive their stuff for weeks on end. SolidCAM hit, and with iMachining........OH SNAAAP! This was THE ultimate combination; and still say that it's AWESOME. Now, for that "but" you've been expecting. The yearly fee's were beginning to get a little crazy; I think this was an industry wide phenomenon though.
Needless to say, I got me a loaf of some Fusion-360 (Fusion-360 Ultimate at the time)and haven't looked back. Don't get me wrong; I miss my native Solidworks/SolidCAM environment but not enough to ever go back. I totally suck at both the modeling side as well as the CAM side; but I still get done what I'd have gotten done in my native system. I still watch the Youtube video tutorials put out by Autodesk as well as end users; the community is GREAT.
Holla at me sometime and we'll work on a project together; I'm all about honing skills. Shoot me an email and we'll exchange info.

Kind regards,
Mike Ward.
[email protected]

I truly believe Solidworks pricing is not in touch with todays realities. The fees are just outrageous! You drop an arm and a leg to buy it then you have to give up a finger every year for the maintenance. Fusion 360 has got their game face on! Fusion keeps getting better and better with each update and the fact that cam is included should be enough to scare the hell out of Solidworks with their old school pricing mentality! I see Fusion or a similar type cloud base system as the new future. Plus it works on both Windows and Mac! A match made in heaven!


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I was in your shoes. Check out this playlist created by Autodesk for Fusion 360 users coming from Solidworks. Really helped me to adapt. 1: Tour of the Interface - YouTube

I didn't see his link posted so here it is for NYC CNC.

NYC CNC
- YouTube

John has a lot of hands on projects from CAD to CAM to running the machine ( Tormach or HAAS ) so it should help you get going as already suggested.

Here is another great channel Lars does a great job breaking down core concepts.

Lars Christensen
- YouTube

Lars and NYC CNC have been very crucial in my learning process with Fusion. But I really wish there was a book or course that started with the basics and took you thru the learning curve. I guess that isn't the way things are these days...

I also find that watching videos of somebody using the software is annoying as a method for learning fundamentals, and I have been keeping an eye open for a comprehensive textbook of some sort. Nothing I've seen yet. The online tutorials are what I started with to get off the ground. The forums are also very useful.

I started with Fusion as one of the "early adopters" on the $300 subscription (Ultimate version for Standard cost as long as subscription is maintained), and I have gotten to a sort of mid-level point of accomplishment. It has a lot of peculiarities and shortcomings, but for its low expense and the continuous improvement that is routinely occurring, still a great deal.

I wanted to let people know that upon watching one of the linked videos in this thread or another I was instantly sold on Fusion360 for what I do. Seriously, it is SO much faster to draw FAST in it and not too hard to remember what and where a thing was I am sure. I wont be getting a seat for another year though probably but I am itching. I would rather draw in 2D a simple oject to toothpath and be done, then extrude it and fillet it in a 3d model for customer etc etc(and you can even making an f-ing blueprint in it!). Some programs are geared towards solid modeling so it takes longer to do simple things. It was fast in solidworks to learn if you had a book with all the dimensions already given.

Just my two cents.

First post. I am a hobbyist "wannabe" machinist. I have a 7x16 mini lathe but have yet to turn it on. It's in my kitchen so it's probably best that I don't try to use it right now.

I am here because of Fusion 360 and a need to make small parts. For now, all I have is an OtherMill Pro. It's not a very powerful mill. In fact I bought it for making circuit boards. The fact that it can mill plastic, brass, and other light duty material was of no interest to me, until now.

I also restore antique radios. I am working on an Arvin made in 1939. Two of the plastic tuning dials are (were) attached to small brass hubs. It looks like they press fit something into the bushing and sandwiched the dials between that. I came up with the idea to create a reproduction brass replacement hub with a small flange drilled for (4) 4-40 brass screws. Of course I will also have to have the dials made. So the it's pretty simple. I just need to learn CAD / CAM software and make a very small part, probably on a metal lathe that I don't know how to use and I have to find someone to create the dial faces (possibly me) from the bits and pieces of dial faces that I have managed to retrieve. Surprisingly, I have a good pic of the dial faces and if I had to I could make a decal to go over a milled piece of clear plastic. I'll see if I can post a few pics. Probably on their own thread.

The point of all of this is that I need some help. I have created the parts in Fusion 360 but when I try to set them up in the CAM section the round stock is 90 degrees from where it needs to be. The stock will sit on the table on one of the round ends. It'll only be 1.125" round stock about .750" "tall". I've been trying to figure out where I went wrong and have gotten nowhere.

Last - Lars and NYC CNC are pretty amazing. This Old Tony is funny and one heck of a craftsman. Check out his CNC router build.

Michael,

Are you near a Haas Factory Outlet? If so, Fusion reps will be at many of the Haas Demo Day locations May 10th.

Another "Autodesk Answer Day" is coming May 24th.

Or if none of the existing videos on youtube help out, send me a PM, and I may be able to take a look. It sounds as though you started to setup your turning stock, but have not set teh axis yet.

jeffj said:

Michael,

Are you near a Haas Factory Outlet? If so, Fusion reps will be at many of the Haas Demo Day locations May 10th.

Another "Autodesk Answer Day" is coming May 24th.

Or if none of the existing videos on youtube help out, send me a PM, and I may be able to take a look. It sounds as though you started to setup your turning stock, but have not set the axis yet.

Click to expand...

I may be on the right path. I started watching Lars Christensen's video series on Fusion 360 CAM last night. I also watched an NYC CNC video about setting up a milling operation. He flew through it too fast for a newb like me but I learned one thing from it. He set his material up in the Model. The first video that I watched on Lars' channel made me understand that CAM is another process that requires more from me. So... yeah... I may not have set up my axis yet. It's tied to an origin in Model but I don't think that is the same thing. I'm glad I've got some time with Autocad (version 10 in the late 80's) otherwise this might take awhile

There's tons of good content on YouTube and other websites for Fusion 360, but I would warn folks about trying to learn it (or machining) from the NYCCNC channel. I'm sure he's a nice enough guy, but I don't think he'd have a prayer of being anything other than a home hobby machinist if he wasn't 'famous' on YouTube.

I appreciate that he's at least up-front about not being an expert at anything (other than marketing himself, obviously) but I see a lot of people citing him as a valuable learning resource. It's the blind leading the blind at that point, and none of his 'followers' have sponsorships to buy them tools and machines, or YouTube ad revenue to pay the bills with when it hits the fan.

Just be skeptical of any and every thing he does at NYCCNC, and pay attention to guys like Lars, who spent a lot of his career actually programming and running machines every day.

I don't think there is anything wrong with learning from the NYCCNC guy, especially on the CAD/CAM side of things. He does a fairly good job of explaining the software and detailing some of the nuances of that particular program.

What I would be weary of though is his actual machinist abilities, but like you said...he doesn't have a problem calling himself out when he effs up.