ExpertCAD™ Overview



ExpertCAD™ gives designers enough flexibility, choice, and control to meet manufacturing needs, this means higher quality drawing output and all the features and capabilities you need to increase 2D design and drafting by a rate of 4-to-1, 5-to-1, or even 10-to-1!

ExpertCAD simplifies even the most difficult aspects of 2D design and drafting in discrete parts manufacturing. It provides all the practical tools you need to design parts for improved manufacturability and to build the most efficient, accurate parts, tools, or fixtures, supporting all your design and drafting requirements from concept to the factory floor.

ExpertCAD is powerful and easy-to-use to help you keep your competitive advantage through:

• Reduced production costs
• Faster drawing turnaround
• Increased productivity
• Improved overall product quality
• Faster time-to-market
  
  

ExpertCAD™ Solutions TOP

ExpertCAD provides these options for your designing and drafting needs:

• ExpertCAD™ — Premier, full-featured ExpertCAD design and drafting solution
• ExpertCAD™ View — Industrial-strength viewing application providing all the full ExpertCAD functionality except file saves

ExpertCAD™ Licensing TOP

Licensing options for ExpertCAD includes node-locked and floating licenses. The Windows® edition uses the industry-leading FlexLM™ floating license solution from Macrovision® to simplify deployment and management of software licenses. Node-locked licenses for Windows utilize a USB compatible hardware key.

ExpertCAD™ System Requirements TOP

ExpertCAD run on Windows® 2000, Windows® XP, Windows® XP Professional x64 and Windows® Vista computers, as well as popular UNIX workstations including Sun SPARC/Solaris 7 and higher and HP PA-RISC/HP-UX 11.

Recommended Upgrades:
A large monitor — 21" — is preferred to maximize the graphics area of the application.

ExpertCAD™ PC Requirements TOP

• CPU: Intel Pentium 4 or AMD equivalent processor
• RAM: 512 Mb.
• Video Card: 64 Mb. nVidia™ based

ExpertCAD™ Features TOP

With ExpertCAD, you can import CAD data; create, modify, or edit designs for manufacturability; generate your own drawings; distribute either hard copy or electronic data to other systems; and interface directly to the CAM system of your choice. ExpertCAD works the way you work and gets the job done right.

Easy to Learn and Use
If you have ever been exposed to CAD in the past, you can master the basics of ExpertCAD in just two or three hours with little or no training. After two days, you will be able to create simple drawings. In one week, you will be creating complex drawings, accessing engineering drawings, importing customer CAD data and editing designs.

• Parametric Parts. ExpertCAD is a friendly, yet powerful product for parametric CAD applications. That is because no special setup operations or macro languages are required. Standard CAD drawings and a user-defined parametric table are all you need.
• ScriptLINK™. This friendly user interface features step-saving icons, pop-up and panel menus, single key commands and mouse/cursor operations — making ExpertCAD easy and convenient to use, no matter what your experience level.
• Translators to Popular CAD Formats. Bi-directional DXF/DWG, IGES and CADRA translators come standard with ExpertCAD.

Powerful 2D Design and Drafting Feature
ExpertCAD gives you all the power you need in a single software package. Most tasks, even 3D views, can be completed in a fraction of the time of other popular CAD systems.

Ease of Use

• A user-customizable interface expands to meet operator needs at every level
• Powerful construction layout capabilities mimic traditional on-the-board drafting techniques and allow even first-time users to be productive
• Multiple text fonts, colors, views, and up to 64 line styles help simplify the drafting process and allow you to conform to existing drafting specifications or company standards
• 1024 named layers help organize and manage even the largest designs
• Design attributes such as name, count, and value are user-definable and fully associative, allowing you to mark components for later use in parts lists or bill of materials
• Integrated component libraries that translate to smaller design files, changes that are more manageable, and more rapid processing for improved productivity
  

Editing

• Unique "lens" feature that lets you edit or take a close-up look at drawing detail while the entire image remains on the screen
• Crosshatching and color for identifying individual parts within an assembly.
• Global editing features improves efficiency by allowing you to make changes all at the same time rather than file by file or layer by layer
• Powerful editing features that includes dynamically moving, copying, mirror imaging, rotating, translating, and more
• Parametric programming facilities for automatic generation of "family" drawings using CAD data from any source

Text and Dimensioning

• Associative dimensioning can be changed automatically from inch to metric
• Automatic geometry revision eliminates recalculating dimensions or re-entering crosshatching; when changes are made to the geometry, the geometry, the part automatically assumes its new shape
• Dimensioning standards allow creation of drawings and designs that comply with ANSI, ISO, DIN, BS or your own internal drafting conversions
• Dimensioning techniques (stacked, chained or ordinate) that can be changed quickly and easily
• Multiple, user-defined text fonts, with variable styles and aspect ratios that be used on the same drawing
• Powerful text manipulation functions for incorporating standard notes quickly and easily
• Simplified search and replace functions through powerful, global text editing tools

Direct Connections to Prospector and ExpertCAM

• A click of the mouse sends completed designs directly to the shop floor for machining in Prospector™; a fully assembled, ready-to-use Prospector project can be generated directly from ExpertCAD
• Design it and machine it with ExpertCAD and ExpertCAM™. Bundled together, ExpertCAD and ExpertCAM are the dynamic duo of 2D production NC programming
• Specialized tools within ExpertCAD make it a snap to prepare design data for production machining
• Direct data interfaces eliminate data translation for a perfect interpretation of design data