If you want to become a manufacturing expert, it is essential to have knowledge of at least three engineering design software.
Mechanical design is a crucial step in the production process and plays a key role in determining the performance of mechanical systems.
In order to achieve high performance standards in mechanical products, computational technology is widely used in mechanical design to support design processes and conduct systems analysis.
Here are the ten most used mechanical engineering design software around the world:
As a mechanic expert, are you familiar with using these tools?
Top 10 Mechanical Engineering Software for Engineers
1. Autodesk Moldflow
Autodesk Moldflow Adviser is part of Autodesk's digital prototyping solution, providing an easy-to-use tool to simulate and evaluate design plans, enabling optimization before manufacturing.
This tool helps minimize possible design flaws, reducing product development cycles and reducing development costs.
In the area of product design and manufacturing, Moldflow offers two leading simulation analysis software programs: Moldflow Plastic Parts Consultant (AMA) and Moldflow Advanced Molding Analysis Expert (AMI).
AMA is easy to use and provides immediate responses to designers' analysis needs and modifications, making it primarily aimed at injection product design engineers, design engineers, and die design engineers.
This allows them to quickly verify the viability of their products during the early stages of development.
The AMA provides quick answers to fundamental manufacturing feasibility questions such as “Can the product be filled?”
With this innovative design approach, both experienced experts and beginners can experience the reliability and practicality of injection molding simulation through AMA.
General Moldflow solution
With the rapid growth of the plastics industry and related industries, competition within the industry has become increasingly intense.
Raw material costs and labor expenses continue to rise, while product prices are falling. At the same time, demands for product quality, functionality and shorter delivery times persist.
2. AutoCAD
AutoCAD is an automated computer-aided design software developed by Autodesk that can be used for drafting, 2D drafting, and basic 3D design.
It allows automatic drawing without the need for programming knowledge, making it widely used globally.
AutoCAD can be applied in many areas, including construction, decoration, industrial design, engineering design, electronics, clothing processing and many others.
Although AutoCAD has impressive graphics capabilities, its table processing functions are relatively weak.
In professional work, the need often arises to create various tables in AutoCAD, such as tables of engineering quantities. Consequently, the question of how to create tables efficiently becomes a practical concern.
AutoCAD has several methods for creating basic graphic objects, such as straight lines, circles, ellipses, polygons, and splines.
Drawing aids.
AutoCAD provides several drawing features, including orthogonal lines, object snaps, polar tracking, and object snap tracking.
The orthogonal function allows users to draw straight horizontal and vertical lines effortlessly.
Object snaps help you select specific points on geometric objects, and tracking makes it easier to draw diagonal lines and locate points in varying directions.
Since AutoCAD 2000, the system has introduced many powerful features.
These include AutoCAD Design Center (ADC), Multi-Document Environment (MDE), Internet Drive, enhanced object snap functions, advanced annotation features, and partial open and partial load functions.
3. Professional/Engineer
Pro/Engineer is an integrated 3D CAD/CAM/CAE software developed by PTC, a US-based company.
It is well known for its parametric capabilities and was one of the first software to introduce parametric technology. Pro/Engineer occupies a significant position in today's 3D modeling software landscape.
Today, Pro/Engineer is widely recognized and promoted in the industry as a new standard in the field of mechanical CAD/CAE/CAM. It is considered one of the main CAD/CAM/CAE software, especially in the area of product design in China.
Pro/Engineer operates on a unified base database, unlike traditional CAD/CAM systems that are built on multiple databases.
This single database ensures that all project materials come from the same source, allowing each user, regardless of department, to work on the same product model.
As a result, changes made at any stage of the design process are reflected throughout the design process, providing greater efficiency and consistency.
In the Pro/Engineer software version, in addition to using major versions such as proe2001, Wildfire, WildFire2.0, WildFire3.0, WildFire4.0, and WildFire5.0, there are also slight version differences in the date codes within each major version.
These different date codes represent the order of the major version release date.
4. SolidWorks
SolidWorks is a 3D design software originally developed on the Windows system.
With its user-friendly interface and ease of use, SolidWorks can automatically capture design intent and guide design changes throughout the product design process.
In SolidWorks assembly design, new parts can be generated directly by referencing existing parts.
Whether the design process uses a “top-down” or “bottom-up” approach, SolidWorks operations make it easy to improve design efficiency.
Users are not only using SolidWorks software to solve general part design problems, but also increasingly turning to it to handle large-scale assembly designs at the system level.
Due to increasing user demand, SolidWorks R&D has significantly improved the upload speed of large assemblies through various means such as distributed data processing and implementing graphics compression technology.
This resulted in a tenfold improvement in the performance of large assemblies.
5. Unigraphics NX
UG, also known as UnigraphicsNX, is a product engineering solution developed by Siemens PLM Software. Offers digital modeling and verification tools for product design and manufacturing.
UnigraphicsNX is a reliable solution for users' virtual product design and process design needs.
Although UG may be commonly used as an abbreviation for user guide and universal grammar, it is primarily associated with UnigraphicsNX in the context of product engineering software.
Furthermore, in the DOTA game, it is referred to as Spectre.
Development of UG (UnigraphicsNX) began in 1969 and was built in the C language.
It is a flexible numerical software tool for solving partial differential equations, which uses adaptive multigrid methods on two-dimensional and three-dimensional unstructured grids.
UG is an interactive CAD/CAM (computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing) system with strong functions that allow easy construction of various complex entities and shapes.
Initially, it was mainly used on workstations. However, with the advancement of PC hardware and the increasing number of individual users, its application on PCs has grown rapidly and has become a mainstream 3D design solution in the die industry.
By using NX for modeling, industrial designers can quickly create and improve complex product shapes. They can also use advanced rendering and visualization tools to maximize the aesthetic requirements of the design concept.
6. Cimatron
Cimatron is a product of the well-known Israeli software company Cimatron.
In China, Cimatron's subsidiary is Simetron (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. The company is now owned by 3D Systems in the United States.
Over the years, Cimatron's CAD/CAM solutions have proven to be an indispensable tool for companies of all sizes, from small die factories to large production departments around the world.
Since its founding in 1982, Cimatron's innovative technology and strategic direction have made it a recognized leader in the CAD/CAM field.
As a leader in integrated CAD/CAM solutions for manufacturing, Cimatron promises to provide comprehensive, cost-effective software solutions for die, tool and other manufacturers.
These solutions can streamline the production cycle, strengthen manufacturers and external sales, as well as improve collaboration with suppliers to significantly reduce product delivery times.
Whether designing for manufacturing or generating safe, efficient, high-quality NC toolpaths for 2.5 to 5-axis milling, Cimatron's manufacturing-oriented CAD/CAM solutions give customers the ability to address parts and manufacturing cycles complexes.
Cimatron guarantees that every product you manufacture is the product you designed.
Cimatron released the new Chinese version, CimatronE10.0.
Its CAD/CAM software solution includes a set of tools to facilitate 3D design, allowing users to conveniently process the acquired data model or perform conceptual product design.
Version 10.0 brought significant improvements to the design and data interface.
Today, more than 4,000 customers around the world are using Cimatron's CAD/CAM solutions to manufacture products for a variety of industries, including automotive, aerospace, computer, electronics, consumer goods, medical, military, optical instruments, communications and electronics industries. toys.
7. Master Camera
Mastercam is a CAD/CAM software platform developed by CNC Software Inc. in the United States for use on personal computers. It offers a variety of functions such as 2D drafting, 3D solid modeling, surface design, voxel stitching, numerical control programming, tool path simulation, and realistic simulation.
The software has a user-friendly interface for geometric modeling and offers an ideal environment for designing parts, including complex curved shapes. Its robust and stable modeling capabilities make it widely used in industrial and educational settings.
Additionally, Mastercam versions 9.0 and higher include Chinese language support, making it a popular and cost-effective choice for small and medium businesses.
It is a versatile, economical and effective software system commonly used in industry and educational institutions.
Mastercam not only offers powerful and stable modeling functions for designing complex curves and surface parts, but also provides robust surface roughing and flexible surface finishing capabilities.
Its reliable tool path verification function allows Mastercam to simulate the entire part processing process.
The simulation not only displays the tools and accessories, but also checks interferences and collisions between the tools, accessories and processed parts, which accurately reflects the actual processing situation.
Mastercam is an excellent CAD/CAM software due to its comprehensive features and capabilities.
Furthermore, it has relatively low system requirements, allowing users to achieve optimal results in processing operations such as modeling design, CNC milling machines, CNC lathes, or CNC wire cutting.
Mastercam offers powerful surface grinding and flexible surface finishing functions. It provides a range of advanced grinding technologies to improve part processing efficiency and quality.
Mastercam also has several curved surface finishing machining functions, allowing users to choose the best method to process even the most complex parts. Its multi-axis machining function provides more flexibility in parts processing.
Mastercam's ease of use is a significant advantage in CNC machining. The generated NC programs are simple and efficient.
Mastercam's main competitors include UGNX, Edgecam, WorkNC, Cimtron, Delcam (Powermill), PTC (Pro/NC), Space-e, CAMWORKS and HyperMILL, etc.
Compared to these softwares, Mastercam has an overwhelming advantage in 2D processing. It also has an advantage on simple rule-based surfaces.
For multi-axis surfaces, the introduction of third-party 5-axis multi-surface machining in the X3 keeps it as the king of general CNC machining.
Mastercam software is widely used in the design and NC processing of general machinery, aviation, shipbuilding, military and other industries.
Since the late 1980s, China has introduced this well-known CAD/CAM software, which has made significant contributions to the rapid growth of manufacturing industry in China.
8. CATIA
CATIA is Dassault's flagship solution for product development in France.
It is a crucial component of the collaborative PLM solution, helping manufacturers design their future products and supporting the entire industrial design process, from pre-project planning to specific design, analysis, simulation, assembly and maintenance.
Its digital prototyping process has gained widespread market adoption since 1999, making it the most widely used product development system worldwide.
The CATIA modular series offers product styling and appearance design, mechanical design, equipment and systems engineering, digital prototype management, mechanical processing, analysis and simulation.
CATIA products are based on an open and scalable V5 architecture. With CATIA's intelligent tree structure, users can quickly and easily modify products repeatedly, even in the final design stages or when updating the original schematic.
CATIA offers complete design capabilities, from the conceptual design of a product to the formation of the final product.
Its accurate and reliable solutions provide full 2D, 3D parametric hybrid modeling and data management capabilities, from single part design to final electronics prototyping.
As a fully integrated software system, CATIA combines mechanical design, engineering analysis and simulation, CNC machining and CATweb network application solutions to provide users with a strictly paperless working environment, especially in special modules for the automotive and of motorcycles.
CATIA offers convenient solutions to meet the needs of large, medium and small businesses in all industrial fields, including products ranging from large Boeing 747 aircraft and rocket engines to cosmetic packaging boxes, covering almost all manufacturing products.
The CATIA series offers 3D design and simulation solutions in eight areas: automotive, aerospace, shipbuilding, plant design, construction, energy and electronics, consumer goods and general machine manufacturing.
CATIA's competitors include UGNX, Pro/E, Topsolid, and Cimatron. NX, Pro/E and CATIA individually occupy around a third of the global market share.
CATIA currently holds the largest market share in design and engineering software thanks to its strong customer base and military experience.
Compared to its competitors, CATIA's advantage lies in its user-friendly interface, powerful features, strong functional support in special industries such as automobile, aerospace, shipbuilding, etc., and global sales cooperation with IT giant IBM.
9. Delcam
Delcam is a well-known professional CAD/CAM software company based in Birmingham, United Kingdom. It is publicly listed on the London Stock Exchange and began its software development at the University of Cambridge, a globally recognized institution.
With more than 40 years of development, Delcam's software covers a wide range of applications, including product design, die design, product processing, mold processing, reverse engineering, artistic design, engraving processing, quality inspection and collaboration management.
Delcam's ongoing software research and development takes place in the UK and US. It has a global customer base of over 40,000, spread across 80 countries and regions around the world.
Delcam is a CAD/CAM software company that has been in the industry for over 40 years. It integrates design, manufacturing, measurement and management and focuses on research, development and technical services. Delcam believes that everything is for the good of users, which is the key to its success.
Delcam not only provides users with leading software solutions, but also offers the highest level of technical support through more than 350 technical support branches in more than 80 countries and regions around the world. This ensures that Delcam can resolve any user issue with the fastest response time.
Delcam is the only CAD/CAM software company with a large CNC machining shop worldwide.
All Delcam software products have undergone rigorous testing in real production environments. This allows Delcam to better understand users' problems and needs and provide a complete suite of products from design, manufacturing, testing and management.
Delcam CAD/CAM series software is widely used in industries such as aerospace, automobile, marine, household appliances, light industrial products and mold manufacturing.
Well-known companies such as Airbus, Boeing/McDonnell Douglas, Hafei, XAC, Chengfei, Toyota, Honda, Ford, Volkswagen, MercedesBenz, Pratt&Whitney, Siemens, Mitsubishi, Canon, LG, Nike, Clarks, FAW Group, Dongfeng Motor Group and Zhuhai Gree are all Delcam users.
10. Edge Camera
Edgecam is automated CNC programming software developed by Planit in the UK. It integrates seamlessly with commonly used CAD software, enabling seamless data transmission.
Edgecam leverages the relationship between the entity and the toolpath, automatically reflecting modifications made to the entity's geometric characteristics in the toolpath, such as height, depth, and diameter, without requiring additional editing.
Edgecam provides comprehensive solutions for combined milling, turning and milling-turning processing methods.
EdgeCAM is a powerful, versatile, easy-to-learn and easy-to-use intelligent CNC programming system that adopts a modular design to meet the needs of different users.
Users can choose modules with different functions to create a customized CAM solution for CNC machining programming that meets their programming needs.
The research and development and promotion of EdgeCAM products focus on meeting the needs of global processing and manufacturing users, providing them with the latest CNC programming functions at the fastest speed to meet the different needs of different users.
After more than 20 years of product development and application, EdgeCAM has more than 40,000 authorized users worldwide.
Planit Group is the leading global manufacturer in terms of installed CAM software. With 84 thousand units installed, it surpasses its competitors in the same sector by 24 thousand units and surpassed its own sales in 2005 by almost 30 thousand units.
Planit Group's portfolio includes EdgeCAM, AlphaCAM, Radan and other CAM software, providing a diverse range of products that protect and strengthen its position in the manufacturing industry.
Edgecam specifically serves the die industry, offering various processing methods to meet different processing needs, including optimized processing for various product processing methods, mold making, turning, composites processing and high-speed processing.
