Art & Inspiration Drafting and Design - The work and tools

Possibly - in common with fixing cars - its only fun when you are doing it because you want to.

 

Exactly!!

 

If you print your 2D drawing at a scale that lets you get the whole thing on one sheet (1/4, 1/2 etc) you can take it to someone like Kinko's and
have it copied full size and to scale. My local one can print up to 36" x 48".
You just tell them what scale the drawing is.

 

I was HOPING you would reply! And yeah, I agree! One technology replaced another, and board drafting/design is incredibly time consuming. THANKFULLY there's a handful of people that still enjoy it on more of a hobby level, and hats off to those who still do it on a productive level for their job or business.

 

I never took drafting in high school. I started as a precision sheet metal worker in the 80's but by the mid 90's my company shut down. I went back to college and got a degree in Mechanical Design using 2D AutoCAD. I got a job as a drafter and got the opportunity to learn Pro Engineer 3D CAD. That was the best career move I ever did. Now I work for a 100 year old company doing 3D CAD. The advantage of working for this company is looking at drawings from the 1920’s to the 1960’s done on the board. We have some of them framed and hanging throughout the engineering department. I can model something in 3D and make a drawing in no time but I’m not an artist like the guys that created the drawings hanging on the wall. Those are truly art!

 

I took manual drafting classes all through Jr. and Sr. high school until I graduated in '87. Never had an interest in computers, my little brother was the "nerd" of the family. But after a couple years delivering pizzas and getting in trouble, my Dad talked me into going to college. The heasd of the drafting dept. said, "Try this AutoCAD thing." I resisted at first, but once I learned it, I never looked back. I still use CAD every day, and like to draw most things I build at home before I pick up a tool. I still love the old greats like Rex Burnet, etc.; he was an artist, not just a draftsman.

 

I also started with 4 years of drafting in High school in the late 70's, then at college. Cad was still the thing of the future. Drafting taught you how to differentiate line weights and drawings presentation, something I don't think most people learn who only use Cad and not trianed in drafting. One Civil firm I worked at years ago had drawers full of old drawings on file, they were true works of art, you could easily frame and sell those. I still have a drafting table with a slide bar, which I use on occasion. Also have one of those old drafting machines. I have an old version of Autocad at home, I use that more, it is great when you're fabbing up some parts and need a quick mock-up or pattern.

 

My Drafting table is up in the rafters of the garage. I had it good while in JR High in Drafting. Told the teacher right off the BAT!!!!!. I wanna draw cars like those on the wall. He said I had to do classroom work first. Well as he explained I did the work. When he was done talking I turned in the work. All of them got A's . Well with 2/3 of the class time to go I did my car drawings .

 

I have been teaching Engineering Design and Drafting Technology for over 20 years - learned initially on the board just when AutoCAD came out (Version 1.2). My initial CAD training was on a machine called Omnitech (think Etch-a-sketch on steroids). My first work experiences were all ink on mylar, working under a true craftsman who took the time to show a kid the ropes and was able to put out some decent drawings. Once I saw my first "quality" CAD job I decided to go into it heavily and that helped me get the teaching job I now have and love.
I will say that looking at some of the old illustrations and drawings are like looking at pieces of art but if you look at some of the real "quality" work put out in Inventor (or similar) you can clearly see the artistry as well. As was mentioned in an earlier post, a true CAD designer / draftsperson will use CAD as the tool to create the their design. I have been fortunate to have had a number of really talented young adults go through my classes and it never ceases to amaze me at their abilities. Sure, we still have some CAD monkeys floating around but the good ones are still out there.
Although I work primarily in the Civil / Municipal arena, I dabble in the mechanical side just for interest. We have a 3D plotter and I am just starting on a CAD model of my 51 Pontiac. I am going to try the new Autodesk Photofly product (3D model from several photos) to try to get it of to a start.

 

I started drafting at age 11 [1964] and was dragged kicking and screaming into CAD around 1988. If you weren't good at manual drafting all CAD did was make your lettering neater.

As a drafting apprentice I worked for a grouchy old German who designed custom machinery. He was a tough master who insisted every feature of a part be specified and you had to explain WHY you were making every dimension and tolerance and finish mark. The best teacher I ever had. My journeyman draftsman card is still a prized possession.

One of the things "lost" with the adoption of CAD is that master/apprentice relationship. Too many of the old timers retired rather than learn computers.

Harry Miller & Fred Offenhauser's "draftsman" Leo Goosen produced drawings that are works of art. Check out the Miller/Offenhauser web site for some of them. Mr. Goosen learned his trade working with David Buick before Buick became part of GM and was still designing racing motors 70 years later.

 

Can anyone show a good photo of Rex Burnett's "perspective platen" and explain how it worked? I saw the pic in Rodder's Journal and am "curiouser" since seeing it!

You used to be able to get a large multi-perspective sheet that had lines from differing points to act as your underlying tracing guide.Haven't seen one on years tho?

 

I remember reading something awhile ago that really rang true. "Technology used to be expensive and skilled labor was cheap. Now it's reversed". I think through the first part of the last century tasks were more labor intensive, and the skilled workers took great pride in demonstrating their skills and talents as a way to stand out. I think the massive technological advances of the WW2 era shifted the focus to the technology and the productivity advances they brought. Then it was the speed and efficiency brought about by the technology that became the focus. Individual skill and craftsmanship became de-emphasized and therefore de-valued by society at large.

Kurt O.

 

I started out CNC programing in 1984 and have progressed to 3D Inventor, Alibre, and Solid Works. I get all types of 3D from our customers and convert it to machine code for our equipment. I like other have said have little artistic ability but the PC makes me equal in the drafting realm.I have drafting table like the second one Scootermad showed, it came from a high school drafting department in the shop department was taken out of service in late 1960's.

 

I got a "D" in my Jr. High School drafting class in 1958 because I
used my class time to draw a cut away view of a Ford Flathead V8
instead of the wooden blocks we were supposed to draw.
In 1963 I got a mechanical drafting job at a machinery company,
drawing with pencils and LeRoy ink pens on paper.
I prostituted my self out doing printed circuit board layout for
higher pay and later (1975) began integrated circuit layout on
Mylar film with pencils for Texas Instruments.
That turned into layout design with CAD systems.
At age 67 I am still doing IC layout design on a CAD system.
Drafting has been a very good gig for me.
BTW, I still have a "Full Race" (a dinosaur term) Flathead in my
shop!

 

My pops was a drafter/designer when I was growing up and I always thought he had some of the coolest "toys" to play with at work. It was always a treat for me to go with him to work on a Saturday and watch him kick out those plans/designs on his CAD system or even cooler his drafting table. It made such an impression that I took mechanical drawing/drafting classes in high school and even had plans to double major in Engineering as well as business...that was about the time most firms started switching over to AutoCad and then the bottom fell out around here...drafting/design, engineering is such a cyclic profession...you know feast or famine...when I saw what dad went though I had a change of heart...now I just draw for myself using his old t-square and other tools of the trade..still something about those old clickable lead pencils...anyway.

 

i had mechanical drawing in high school and i enjoyed it to no end. when i got out of the navy i got a job at long beach naval shipyard in the mid 70's and worked in the design department doing drawings of us navy ships, and when i entered the apprenticeship program for welding one of the calsses we had was drafting, but it was a step back wards because i went from doing drawings of modifications of the ships to beginning drafting. i tried to explain to the instructor and show him my work from before to challenge the class and it landed on deaf ears. there is nothing like doing a job the old fashioned way. it has a personal touch that each individual can only put in and on the project.

in todays world the personal touch is basically gone. there is only a few places left that have the personal still alive and well, besides a home cooked meal.

a hotrod is a great example....

no two are the same, and no two will ever be the same.

get out of the box be individualist.....................

 

My Dad was an electrician and worked at Lockheed missiles in Sunnyvale in the early sixties. Worked off of blueprints on Top Secret stuff. He said there were some pretty fair draftsmen there. Now, I couldn't draw a fly. But you artsy-fartsey guys as you call yourselves, could do some hotrod cutaways for us! I would buy some for sure. The Hamb charities could use a boost . What say? Lippy

 

Gave my drafting table to one of my last Grad students when I retired......after years involved with hand processes of all kinds I too am sick of...... digital cleanliness.....have to admit I like work where the hand of the artist is present.........even if it's just their style.....

 

I am not a drafter by any means but I can understand some of the differences between CAD and hand drawn style. I think the thing with hand drawing is by far the ability to generate those higher order curves and ratios of proportion which are more difficult to achieve on a computer.

With a computer it is difficult to translate more subtle ratios which are intuitive to a human mind and eye into computer talk.

for example. I want a rectangle which has a length to side ratio of around 2.3 to 1 now I have to figure out how to make a cut away portion of the upper right corner with a reducing radius curve down to the right side vertical with the appropriate ratios that are pleasing to the eye.

On the other hand I tend to design my fabrication and parts in ways that allow me to actually make the part. I can honestly say I suck at stacking machining operations and If I have to refixture a part multiple times the part is almost certainly doomed to failure. Also I dont have NC machinary and there are large holes in my access to fabrication tools and equipment.

I think some of these basic design courses should be mandatory in high school, along with basic maintenance things. I see stuff all the time in engineering school (electrical) where these kids (I am 10 years older than everyone going back as an old timer). Anyway these kids know some pretty interesting stuff but their minds are unable to differentiate a starter from an ignition system.

The school wants us to be producing drawings for our electrical projects but only the mechanical engineering students really learn any amount of cad stuff.

one of my dreams would be to own an engineering design firm with a team of hot shot designers/engineers who could design a solution to almost any problem.

 

Amen, I really wish I could back in time. Hell the Jr. High I went to in the mid 70's does not even have any shop classes anymore . I would say I got to learn the last of the old school ways because it all changed fast.

 

I've been fortunate enough to progress from one year of mechanical drafting in high school in the late '70s and architectural drafting in college during the early '80s to working in the most-current versions of AutoCAD and Revit today. I was hardly an exemplary mechanical hand drafter- graphite on shirts sleeves, poor hand lettering, vellums hardly kept clean without "scumbags" to rub off the haze, finger cuts from mylar overlays.

The first time I had CAD was in the mid-'80s on a system that had a 12-button "puck" and a digitizing tablet, but by the time I went to work after I got my Master's Degree in '89 it was pencil on vellum at a small design-build contractor, then mylar/plastic lead or Rapidograph pens/ink for final at a small architecture firm, then back to vellum/pencil at a two-person architectural firm until late '91 when they decided to train me, the young intern, on AccuDraft, and eventually AutoCAD v.8 when they had to start exchanging files with consulting engineers. Pen plotters required refilling, cleaning, load individual sheets and were noisy as hell. By the mid-'90s I got to "graduate" to a larger firm and more up-to-date equipment like laser printers and AutoCAD 10, and never looked back.

I will say this - the experience I had received with hand drafting is something the young interns and techs of the past 15-20 years will never have unless they're paired with some old-timer who hangs on to old methods. Layout had to be thought out, and once you started line work you darn well better protect your work. And believe me I've worked with many old-timers who wouldn't dream of using a keypad or mouse. I don't miss Leroys, lettering guides, drafting machines and Mayline bars, the aluminum tubes you rolled sheets into at the base of the drafting board, incandescent drafting lights that put out so much heat you sweated constantly, uncomfortable drafting stools, lead pointers, Rapidiograph pens or the other trappings of hand drafting when I consider all the tools I have at my disposal for 3D modeling and rendering, layering, plotting, etc.

 

I got out of college in 66 and started as a young engineer at the then Douglas Aircraft, mostly working on structural stuff, the drawings were on vellum and some were 20 feet long, all at full scale. Went to work for Pratt and Whitney Machine Tool designing giant machine tools and stayed in the machine tool industry for the next 20 years, mostly really big stuff and all drawn by hand on vellum. I call it "pencil CAD" still do it today, have a drafting board in my shop next to my fab equipment and use it to layout ideas for what ever I am building at the time. Never got into CAD as it was just starting when I went into project management. I presently have drawings for my next project, a Bonneville lakester on my drafting board and still love to do it. All of the new CAD stuff is pretty slick but I think that doing the original "concept" drawings on a piece of paper with a pencil is still the best way.

The leading Formula 1 designer, Adrian Newley at Red Bull Racing, still does his original design on a drafting board with a pencil before he turns it over to the computer guys.

Rex

 

PB,

It gets a different set of wheels turning in my head..... but I use far more eraser than I do graphite


IF Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.... is great computer generated art made to look like it was hand done fake patina?

I have the Model A piece done by "design165" hanging in my office and I really like the piece.

http://www.design165.com/#!art

 

Like a couple of other posters, I began my engineering career back in the 'dark ages' in the Pulp & Paper industry. (Working as an engineer and spending millions of dollars of other peoples money was a wonderful part of my life.) I struggled long and hard after we got our first PDP-8 and it never improved for me. I finally came to the realization that I was a bit of a techno tard and slowly changed my career direction when Acad-9 arrived... Now days, I am happily on my board with my trusty Mutoh model 'L' for anything that I need to design and outside shops that I deal with seem to have no problem converting my paper into whatever form they need.

Note to Jeff: I love your 'tool' box!

Gary

 

I posted this over on the Gear Journal a few weeks ago: http://www.gearjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?p=3549#post3549


I will forever be on the lookout for an old oak drawing table.

 

I spend my days doing 2D AutoCAD for a company that builds grain storage and handling facilities, its nowhere near as cool as the stuff posted on this thread

 

Hey Scoot,

Ain't the first drawing one of the Wright Brother's engine used in their epic flight?

No CAD skills for me, on a good day I can master a crayon & sometimes a brush




" It's sad to see such qualities of mind bent to such a sorry purpose. ''
- Peter Ustinov-

 

One of the things I like most about cad is that with the "Noting" font my lettering is fianlly passable.

 

Actually, autocad is dated now, everyone's using solidworks or they're using cad's 3d rendering, or add-on widgets for autocad. I know the local community college only offers 1 or 2 cad classes before putting you into solid works and 3d rendering stuff.

There's a lot of stupid stuff we see on prints in the field where something is done a certain way because that's how they have to do it according to the add-on program they're using.

I started with hand drafting and then learned 2D autocad, but I have to say if you ever have to lay something out without a computer there's no substitute for learning the hand method. I've had to do a lot of field modifications in my time where all that hand layout has come in hand... simple things like bisecting a line segment to get a perpendicular angle, or using a piece of string, a nail, and a pencil to lay out a perfect circle to cut a hole.

There's no substitute for knowing the basics, IMO. If an apocolypse came tomorrow it wouldn't do survivors any good to know that we used to have computers that could take a chunk of steel and cut it to any shape you needed unless they knew HOW to build the computer, and HOW to write the software, and HOW it all worked.

Mathius