ZW3D CAD/CAM Anyone heard of this?

Lapuser said:

Much to my surprise while coming here for another reason I see this post. ZW3D ex VX as noted is an OK value for the price tag if you don't go over say about $6,500.00 for the everything but 5 axis package. After dealing with the awful program CAMWorks for Solid Edge I had to rethink how bad ZW3D was in comparison. ZD is dated and while is quite good for complex shapes falls down for basic MCAD work. Primarily a mold and die program which it does well in. Very poor sheet metal and very basic direct editing which is what led me to leave years ago for Solid Edge which is still my favorite for design. The CAM side is quirky and while you can do almost anything in 3 axis you have to learn the hidden goodies. Two axis is complicated at times and I don't know why this has to be. No worthwhile high speed machining strategy and Adaptive from HSM, heck all of HSM does far better. The Chinese love to tinker with the GUI for no benefit to the users I can see every year and you will have to learn where your commands went every year. It is not advancing as quickly as it's competitors. In machining this is a big deal as I could not dream of cutting the sheer number of cubic inches of material removed per hour with ZW compared to HSM Adaptive. Lathe in CAM is not much. Yearly maintenance for ZW is cheap but US support is not all that good unless you manage to have a good VAR of which there are darned few here.

I currently have Inventor Pro HSM which I bought for the machining. HSM I think is really good for three axis milling which is all I do. Turning is crude but they are working on it. I tinker with Inventor CAD every once in a while and I see what people do in it. It probably can do anything if you spend the time to get through the labyrinth and can do far more than ZW. Personally I still use my seat of SE for all serious CAD work.

The best deal out there right now is Inventor HSM for $7,500.00 and like $1,250.00 per year for a permanent seat. Permanent seats will no longer be available to new customers early next year so look and buy quickly. Once in they won't take it away from you. If cost is a concern and you can live with your intellectual property being bandied about on the web Fusion 360 is the very cheapest thing going to get involved in and if you are a student or startup Autodesk will give you freebies so check them out.

While I do not dislike ZW3D like I once did I would not use it again. The first time you see how much metal you really can remove with a true high speed machining program compared to the old style stepover endmill breaking thing like ZW you will never look back. I did however make money with them on my old 93 Haas VF3. If you have newer equipment with high speed machining you won't be able to use ZW and get all the benefits of it. I don't remember the last time I used ZW even though it is still loaded on my workstation.

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Lapuser said:

I used ZW3D up to 2012 and had a look at ZW 2015. 2015 was so different it was like starting over and I could not see any compelling things for past users in there. You like to tinker I would spend my time with Fusion 360 which has a decent CAM side to it also. If you use Solid Works I think there are freebies in there to.

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m98custom1212 said:

Used fusion since the beginning but the cloud turns me off because autodesk has the native data. I don't mind cloud services in general usually because you can keep local copies and just syncs with the services servers

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rlockwood said:

Cant you save out a .f3d? I mean, it's useless without fusion, but no different than a .sldprt without solidworks.

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m98custom1212 said:

Yes, but I would have to export and upload but into A360 all the time what a pain.

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csharp said:

Also you cant just open a .f3d file locally, it has to be uploaded first to A360 then opened. You have to open Fusion and upload to A360 then open from data panel.

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csharp said:

I see what you are saying but it is not really "opening" the file but creating a new file derived from that file it even gives it a tab called untitled. So now you would have to export it and over write the existing file. You can't just open from window explorer with a double click.

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csharp said:

I am not against it, just saying it is not all that convenient. It is better than I had been doing, thanks for the tip.
When I think of open locally I think double click from explorer not create new from file. Either let people do it or don't. So yes it does work as you are saying. So I could just work offline for good. I think onshape has a good model and they are sticking with it. If you follow the forum there were people who did want an offline version. They stuck to their guns and said no.

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Atomkinder said:

I mean... sure... but that's sort of a process/semantics argument. It's still opening the file locally, and no cloud need be involved. Granted Autodesk would like to not have you do this, so they don't make it very simple or clear (I know you have experience with this one ).

I do wish I could make Fusion a default program for CAD files, or at least on the right-click menu, but I don't see it happening.

Also, why is no one ever railing against OnShape for this reason? You don't even get local software with them!

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csharp said:

I am not against it, just saying it is not all that convenient. It is better than I had been doing, thanks for the tip.
When I think of open locally I think double click from explorer not create new from file. Either let people do it or don't. So yes it does work as you are saying. So I could just work offline for good. I think onshape has a good model and they are sticking with it. If you follow the forum there were people who did want an offline version. They stuck to their guns and said no.

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