"Alibre Design Personal" Replaces Standard & Xpress versions; New Alibre Products

Alibre is a powerful but easy-to-use 3D mechanical CAD package which is distributed and supported in Australia through CADDIT.net. Beginning in mid-May, Alibre no longer offered a "Standard" version of their CAD software. Alibre Design "Standard" has been replaced with the Alibre Design "Personal" version, mainly for hobby use. Also, the free version referred to as "Alibre Design Xpress" will no longer be available to new users. Current users of these products, however, should be able to continue using them as-is without any change to their software. A note to those who purchased Alibre Design from us during our last promotion, well done - you have a package worth about $1000 for under $200. Alibre Design Personal now has some new limitations in comparison to its predecessor, Alibre Design Standard:

• Single install license (no take-home license, multiple keys etc)
• Advanced Import / Export features are deactivated
• Import DWG / DXF is still enabled
• Export .STL is still enabled for 3D printers
• Publish 3D PDF (for models only) is still available
• No STEP, IGES, SAT, Rhino, image files
• Files are not enumerated unless you select All files (*.*)
• Turn-off Advanced Detail Drawing (see further..)
• No Bill of Materials
• No Detail, Section, Partial, or Broken views
• No views for Centers, Cosmetic Threads, External Threads, or No Hole Call-outs

CAD users looking for competent 3D mechanical CAD software are really encouraged to at least go with Alibre Design Professional now. Algor DesignCheck FEA is now called "Simulation Express" from Autodesk and will continue to be available as before. Alibre also has a new partner for delivering photo-realistic rendering to all Alibre Design Professional and Alibre Design Expert users. Luxion's KeyShot For CAD is now included in both versions and is available in Australia from CADDIT. Other Luxion users include PTC, Cadkey, SpaceClaim and Rhino. NOTE Alibre expects to also have new KeyShot BIP file export enabled within Alibre Design by the end of June.

KeyShot For CAD allows Alibre Pro and Expert users to create full photo-realistic images for their model within minutes. And - much like Alibre itself - Keyshot is easy to use. Drag-and-drop materials, preset lighting, and real-time updates give you the final result all the time. KeyShot is the first and only rendering application that offers real-time ray-tracing. This means that your model is constantly being rendered as you zoom, pan, rotate, and apply materials and lighting presets. For more information about Alibre Design 3D CAD in Australia feel free to CONTACT CADDIT.net. A free 30-day PROFESSIONAL trial of Alibre Design can be downloaded HERE.

A Preview of Alibre CAM 2.0 CNC Software

The upcoming release of Alibre Design 12.1 (SP1) will include major enhancement to the basic CAM software included free with Alibre Design Expert, as well as the four- and five-axis options available for Alibre CAM Professional and Alibre CAM Expert. Improvement to the Alibre CAM Interface will make CNC programming inside Alibre Design much easier and enjoyable to do. Here is one comparison between the crowded old (left) tab interface and the new (right) cascading style:

But more than the lookand feel of Alibre CAM will change. A new entry method has been added to 2.5 axis profile milling operations allowing you to have more control over the entry angle.You can now create tabs/bridges for 2.5 axis profiling operations. You can specify the bridge height and length. You can also specify whether you want to use a particular number of bridges which will be equally distributed around the profiles or you can set an exact distance between bridges. Below is an example of the same cut-outs using 5 bridges and 10 bridges per profile.

The Tool Libraries will allow "drag and drop" of pre-defined tools into the active tool set. There will also be an option to immediately preview a tool upon creation.

Alibre CAM 2.0 will now support avoidance regions to specify where the tool should not cut, for example to avoid clamps holding the stock material down on your CNC machine. Flat faces can be directly selected as machining / avoidance regions instead of having to use sketches. You can also select the starting point for the engagement of the tool for Machining Operations defined by sketches.

Alibre CAM Standard will offer along-path-3D-entry for 3 axis horizontal finishing offers more control over surface finish for steep areas of parts. Specifying the engage angle and path height allows you to control the smoothness of the engage motion, helping to eliminate unwanted marks on the cut part that would otherwise need to be buffed out later. Alibre CAM Professional will also enjoy improvements to 4 axis milling.

Alibre CAM Expert will add a new 3D Offset profiling method, 3D Offset pocketing for making constant offset tool paths on the part surfaces, 3 axis pencil tracing now offers multiple passes & 3 axis valley re-machining allows split cuts, step over and cut control. Tool Holder Collision determines the minimum tool length required to avoid collision.

Alibre Design is sold in Australia by CADDIT. Download Alibre Design / Alibre CAM in Australia for a free 30 day "Professional" trial before software reverts back to free "Xpress" mode.