FreeCAD 0.20 For Beginners | 16 | Assembly with Fasteners | Assembly 4 WB

Learning how to use FreeCAD to create assemblies joined with fasteners (nuts, screws, washers and bolts). We will learn the basics of the Assembly 4 workbench, a FreeCAD add on along with the fasteners WB. Using both Part and Part Design mobels and assemble them together. Easy on the beginner we will understand what a local coordinate is and how parts are assembled and linked together. Starting in Free cad we create a part design object then create a part workbench object. Will then connect these together in an assembly using iso standard threaded nuts and bolts which can be customised.
This course is aimed to teach the fundamentals of free CAD understanding the basics but delivering via teaching you different workflows.
We aim to teach you freeCAD in a practical way.
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[@gillesreyna1272]

Excellent, like your other videos. Thank you

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Glad you enjoyed, thank you :)

[@gzoechi]

"Model" was renamed to "Assembly" since, in case anybody else wonders as well. Great Video 👍 The step placing screw at holeaxis (23:45) doesn't seem to work in 0.20.2. The axis is created in the body, but placing a part only lists LCS on the part level. Found it. The holeaxis can be moved to the parent level, then it works. (I created parts and assembly in the same file and probable did something slightly differently)

[@russellw5447]

Thanks to those who share solutions, they help us all out. Thought I followed instructions? Generally dragging into the Heirarchy works. Noticed MJelly advised about Gliches in this section, I'm not complaining FCAD surprises Me more the more I use it.

[@XXXmags]

I've been covering your videos from this entire playlist. Fantastic work. This is extremely helpful for us wanting to learn freecad. Thanks again :)

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Great to hear that's is helping and glad your enjoying the tutorials

[@tsb247]

Your videos are amazing, and they are helping me to learn FreeCAD. I came from CATIA v5, SolidWorks, and AutoCAD, so these videos are incredibly helpful!

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Great to hear. 😁 Welcome to the journey

[@djram1072]

Thanks for the videos. They help me learn a lot.

[@Aztechyian]

Thanks as always - this was a great tutorial and definitely helped advance my knowledge. Such a good series to follow.

[@adamstewarton]

great work mate! thanks for the lesson :)

[@BernieA01]

Thank you very much for this excellent video: Clear, focused on practical use, optimal speed and voice 👏🏻

[@HouseDoctorRay]

Thank you very much. Very helpful video to help get me going on Assembly 4.

[@donstelfox2936]

Excellent, thank you, Cheers.

[@sjn8099]

Was geat. Thank you for your work 🙂

[@iqbal0840]

Amazing tutorial i am learning

[@davidallan6036]

Another well presented tutorial 👍

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Thank you 👍

[@saratdas918]

You did a great KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) vid. Waiting for a couple more on Assembly 4.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Thank you. I find there are not enough videos out there like that. Especially when it comes to other 3D packages like rhino or blender, especially with all those shortcut keys! !

[@MyHeap]

Great video and thank you so much for the explanation and help. I appreciate it. On the topic of fasteners, I can put a thread on a shaft by using the die, but cannot figure out how to make it a body that I can insert into an assembly. I am going to experiment with it, now that I saw the create part button you showed. I am hoping this is the right way to do it. Thank you again for your great tutorials. It helps this old guy! Joe

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Did that solve it?

[@MyHeap]

@@MangoJellySolutions Yes, the create part button solved that issue. Speaking of assemblies. I can add another assembly into the current assembly. (Let's call it a sub assembly) But I am unable to add LCS to either assembly to put them together. Can this be done? Could you show a simple example of how to attach an LCS to an assembly that is not an added fastener? If you want, I can make a video of what I am trying to do. Thank you again for your most excellent videos. Joe

[@pps8769]

Great video. Thank so much!👍

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Glad you enjoyed.

[@neilweideman2938]

Thanks!

[@yakdaymar6659]

Good thank you

[@nams37]

Thank you

[@Iqballotelli]

thank you.

[@Sembazuru]

Nice video, well explained. I was going to ask for a comparison of the different assembly workbenches (and maybe some guidance over which one to use when). But you mention that you'll be doing that in the future so I'll just keep an eye on your channel. ;-)

[@Ed_Downunder]

Good video, thank you. Drawing a single part has only so much value. Drawing a part may be complicated or simple like your demo part. It is the assembly of parts that makes FreeCAD valuable. Thank you.

[@donstelfox2936]

Greetings Mr. Pritchard, I've been using FreeCAD for several years. I hope you don't mind if I offer an amendment to your comment of FreeCAD's value. I would say that FreeCAD has great value as is my experience, however, the ability to assemble is a great enhancement to that value. Cheers, Don

[@Ed_Downunder]

@@donstelfox2936 Hello Don, You are right of course, I was pointing out the difference between parts and assemblies.

[@donstelfox2936]

@@Ed_Downunder I hear you, I sensed you weren't being negative, I just didn't want anyone getting the wrong impression. Cheers friend.

[@giuliobuccini208]

I still think that A2+ assembly-workbench is way much more easy to use when compared to Assembly 3 or 4. With A2+ you have not to deal with that bunch of LCS for every part you add. Specifying of the right position of every LCS can be a PITA when you don't know the exact dimensions of your components, and/or you have to resize the parent one for any reason... With A2+ you can simply say "make this edge coincident with that edge". Et voilà the components are assembled. Disadvantage of A2+: the naming problem.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

I totally agree, the whole keep it simple philosophy of A2Plus makes it such a simple workbench. It's funny you should say about this, the next video I have compiling is using A2Plus. Of the two it's my favorite I just wish the simulation of parts under constraint was faster but other than that I find the workbench a joy to work with.

[@Daniel-cc5ph]

Hi to UK, and thanks for the great tutorials!!! Hobby woodworker here. i started out with FreeCAD to do my furniture drafts and techdraws for woodworking. Therefore i use the Assembly WB. I did some examples in A2plus and Assmbly4 WB. Which one, do you recommend for the future for my needs?

[@paulswarthout9967]

Awesome video. I built this assembly alongside your video. I spent a lot of time stopping the video and backing up and rewatching many parts of it to get my build just right. Many of the problems I encountered have to do with you building from FreeCAD 0.20 and me building from FreeCAD 0.21. Several things have been renamed, such as 'import part' is now 'insert part', and popup dialogs are different, etc. It was a great teaching tool. And I got through it and learned a lot. So thank you! I have a question: At the end, I tried taking this assembly and exporting it as a STL Mesh, like I do for my other prints. Opening the .STL file in Cura, it reverted back to an unaligned pile of parts, and missing the extra Clip part. So, what should I export the assembly as, in order to properly slice it? I don't need to print the example, but I did want to slice it for printing.

[@TijgerPapa]

Is the edit placment of part not working on 0.21.1? When adding the fastner, it's not in the correct place. Had to drag the screw onto the Assembly tree, then it worked.

[@xts242]

Thanks. This worked for me.

[@yomajo]

I wish community will adopt Solidworks approach to positioning bodies in space. You select one face - another - click -> there's a bind in one direction fixed. Do this two more times, two parts cant move. Creating LCS for each of parts and each of relations to other parts, its wouza, considering real world things are assembled of subassembies, each of them might be having 30+ parts. So x3 coords - and you have a nice tool to print parts, but not prepare technical drawings for assembly lines...

[@yomajo]

nvm, next video has that approach with A2plus addon...

[@MangoJellySolutions]

I just seen from your next comment you already have found the A2Plus workbench. More similar to what you describe. I prefer A2Plus as its a lot more quicker to assemble your parts.

[@yomajo]

@@MangoJellySolutions ya. Actually my long term goal is builing an online configurator for eshop with 3d model vizialization, so educating myself on basics first. Regardless, thank you for doing these, you are a great instructor!

[@boosted_bugzilla]

How did you make the lines and the length/degree number thats in blue that shows when youre placing a line bigger and easier to read? They are so thin and the blue numbers are really tiny. Also i cant seam to select 2 points at once, if i click one and then another it deselects the first point. Also howd you get the model to be transparent and show the pockets in the part when highlighted and theyre not on a visible surface?

[@felderup]

is there any way to make the fasteners show up in an a2+ part list? i removed the fastener workbench after the mess of doing about 50 and reverting.

[@russellw5447]

Noticed at 28.00 when positioning the Nut I had the same problem with Positioning drop down or icon. Solved by dragging Nut into Assembly Hierarchy again. System Bug/ Glich? Sure I followed Mjelly.

[@eggie3797]

Legend

[@MangoJellySolutions]

😁😁😁😁

[@RoamingAdhocrat]

Thank you, this makes sense. Is there a way to position parts face-to-face intuitively, rather than using z-offset every time? I remember using Solid Edge as a student way back when, which had this feature - you could snap parts together quite nicely.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

I saw you got it solved with the other video 😊 also I have another video regarding the constraints on a2 plus workbench.

[@yamlcase230]

@@MangoJellySolutions I have the same question as this, which video are you referring to?

[@Nick_Sorenson]

Mating the assembly is not anywhere as simple as SolidWorks. I wish they could come up with a simpler part/assembly mating system. But it is FREECad so it isn't the end of the world.

[@martinsvensson6884]

Seems like a complicated and very limited process to assemble things compared to Autodesk Inventor for example. They need to fix that. Needs to have assembly constraints (similar to the process in 2D sketch mode) where you can just click on the surfaces (or axes/planes) of each part and chose to align them in a certain way. Then you also have the ability to drag things and visualize how they will move against each other when not fully constrained. Can be very useful. So not ready to replace Inventor yet :) Even for basic stuff beyond 1 part. But will get much closer if that is fixed.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

A2 plus workbench for assembly is what your looking for if you want to assemble in this way and for me far the best solution so far. There is an integrated assembly coming out in version 0.22 (or what will be version 1). As there has been no assembly workbenches then the community have come up with their own solutions so there are some weird and wonderful ones out there (there are more than just the two!)

[@martinsvensson6884]

@@MangoJellySolutions Ok, thanks for the info!

Is this only for Assembly workbench then ?- it is amazing workbench but hardly usable for Part and minus, would be nice to have a lets say a cube and do the minuts with faster to get a proper hole - (even for head, if wanted) , But since it does not support clearance if I am not mistaken, it is not so much useful :( unfortunately

[@Timbodacious]

at 15:40 in assembly 4 my dropdown menu doesnt show the option to click "new model" new versions seem to have been renamed to "Assembly" in the dropdown menu

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Thanks for adding that. I need to update some of these earlier tutorials in the series and there are some small differences since updates to assembly workbenches. Thank you for pointing that out. I will add it to the list.

[@classic_sci_fi]

Got it to work but why is the rectangle part outlined in white?

[@MangoJellySolutions]

I think you may have your sketch still visible that you created the action from. Find that sketch and hide i by clicking on it and pressing the spacebar. You can select it from screen as well. Hope that helps.

[@leroycasterline1122]

At about 18:30, after you import the Clip a "Place linked part" dialog is displayed. When I import the Clip nothing is displayed. I can find nothing in the context menu or toolbar called "Place linked part". I did find an option "Edit placement of a part" in both the toolbar and the context menu, but regardless of what's selected in the Tree it's always greyed out. Checking in the Addon Manager, I've got Assembly4 version 0.12.4 installed, which may not be the version you are using. I'm flat stuck with no apparent way to "Attach to" the Parent Assembly. I've tried this in 0.20.1 (the current release) as well as the 0.21 beta and even the portable version of 0.20 - no joy!

[@leroycasterline1122]

I've finally got this figured out - I neglected to click on "Clip#Body" before typing "Clip" in the "Name for the link" box!

[@hjtv3900]

@@leroycasterline1122 I had the same problem. Watched the video a couple of times until it "clicked" in my head that one has to really click at "Select Part to be inserted:", even when there is only 1 part displayed.

[@johnowens8046]

I had the same problem. Thanks for the tip.

[@leroycasterline1122]

While watching your videos I've noticed that you often have to remove redundant constraints, while I don't. You have 'Auto remove redundants' unchecked while it was on by default on my system. Is there a danger in having this option enabled?

[@MangoJellySolutions]

No it's fine leaving it on. I tend to leave it off just to show the process if anyone wondering why the sketch has gone orange.

[@RandomRichard2022]

Great tutorial. I'm just not sure I understand the point of creating all the parts in different files, then importing them into an Assembly document and importing them. Couldn't I simply create all the parts in the same document and just move the parts around to align them? ? In short, what's the point of the Assembly Workbench? Could, you explain that in more details. Thank you.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

It's really down to personal preference if you want to have the files individually or all in the same project. Having them individually allows you to borrow from each of the files to build the assembly and allows you to organise your parts for reuse. As for the point of a assembly you can see how all the parts fit together for creating a multipart project, or you could make a technical drawing from the finished assembly also, one of the most practical examples for 3D printing is print in place models where all the individual parts are connected together in an assembly and then printed to save construction. I have a example video on my channel of a simple example.

[@RandomRichard2022]

​@@MangoJellySolutions Thank you for the reply. So, if I understand correctly, it's simply a workflow choice to use the Assembly workbench? I'm guessing it's also just a personal choice to use Assembly 4 instead of A2plus, or is there a reason for it? Thank you for your help.

[@JohnDoe-fv5cu]

How have you learnt freecad so well? Just by documentation or did you take part in its development?

[@MangoJellySolutions]

I originally came from another 3D package and when I picked up freeCAD, documentation was thin on the ground. It was a lot of perseverance including jumping in and looking through the source code. It's taken me a long time, every single thing that I did in the other packages I wanted to know how to do in freeCAD. The reason why I made this channel was to fill the gap in the knowledge for others so they don't have the rough ride I did :)

[@PyronoxOmega]

am having trouble following the tutorial, i did exactly as mentioned however when i came to attaching the nut to the assembly the button in the toolbar and the menu is grayed out no matter how many times i deleted and added and refreshed the model cant get it to work, kindly let me know where i went wrong

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Could you please tell me which button you are referring to

[@PyronoxOmega]

@@MangoJellySolutions i figured my mistake, for some reason the model got erased so i recreated a new one moved the parts inside and bam! everything worked. anyway thank you for getting back to me loved the tutorials btw... one a side note if you have DISCORD i would love to join

[@mikecarter2111]

Can you model a new part while in assembly mode referencing other parts in the assembly?

[@MangoJellySolutions]

I have never tried but if your referencing the assembly in your new part then you may run into issues if you move or remove a part on the assembly depending of what your are doing.

[@MichailBogdanov]

Good afternoon. I really liked your video. I tried to make two details in one file . But I can't place a new sketch on the surface of the second part. Maybe it's a bug or I don't understand something?

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Thank you, 😁 regarding your problem, do you get any messages?

[@jmadden5097]

Hi - great video, it's helped me move up my Freecad skills. One issue I'm having....I can follow everything to the point that I need to align the screw into the bracket hole in Assembly 4. After the LCS's are defined, I click on the screw part in the assembly, it is selected, but the "Place Part in the Assembly" icon remains greyed out and I can't move it. Any help?

[@jmadden5097]

I should add I am using Freecad 0.20.2

[@jason_a_clark]

The same thing happened to me. For me it required to drag and drop the screw into "Assembly" in the tree and you should get the option, if you haven't already figured out a solution.

[@Mids1970]

for the life of me i cannot get this to work i have reinstalled Freecad (0.20.2) i have tried even simpler designed parts but i cannot get the bolt in the hole I'm pulling out what's left of my hair that damned placement of part icon will not ungrey

[@user-oh4it6vn6n]

Reading another comment for a clue; ensure the bolt/screw is within the "Assembly" hierarchy.

[@Mids1970]

@@user-oh4it6vn6n I'm a month on now and have progressed slot from 3d cad to tech draw and even out to 3d print but that icon will not ungrey , import a nut or bolt at the primary LCS and move it with the transform now

[@russellw5447]

Thanks solved it for Me also. Something similar happened in prev Tut. System Bug, I'm sure I followed imnstructions?

[@w.binder-freecadchannel]

how to make a circular spring in FreeCAD?

[@MangoJellySolutions]

It's a bit old but this may help FreeCAD: Spring and Bolt Animation in Assembly4: kzbin.info/aero/PLWuyJLVUNtc1l-CgYvj4HdG9mgQsRvKH3

[@MiveyTech]

Why can't I see the assembly dialog in my build. Please show me thank you very much

[@MiveyTech]

i am newbie

[@leroycasterline1122]

This may be beyond the scope of the video, but I don't understand the LCS Circle name "Pocket:Edge14" as we didn't select the edge of a pocket. Please feel free to ignore this question 🙂.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Do you know at which point in the video that is? . Trying to scan through so I can answer your question but not sure at what point

[@leroycasterline1122]

@@MangoJellySolutions Sorry, it's at about 10:20.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

@@leroycasterline1122 Ah yes I see. The pocket is the last operation (at that point) in the treeview. In part design this is linear and looking from bottom up hows a history of operations taken to create that model up to the step you have just taken. Though you have created a sketch and pocketed say a hole, the edges of the hole that is created will not be called pocket but the whole model at that point in time because all operation create one single body in this workbench. The name comes from the name of the operation in the treeview followed by the edge selected. Don't worry that this may be a little hard to understand but once you get to grips with it in one CAD package it applies to all.

[@RobertSpiller]

I wonder if this could be useful inventors? I can't afford autodesk inventor....any suggestions.

[@charlesblack7989]

Yes, it is.

[@dushyantvyas4087]

So basically Assembly 4 is without geometrical constraints. It is more time consuming and not practical for the Large Assembly. A2plus WB is practically awesome but it is fundamentally broken, you don't know when A2plus decide not want you to assemble part. I am speaking from my personal experience. Although the new development version 0.22 Assembly looks promising though.

[@ph08nyx]

It's too complicated. I am sure that if I try to repeat this without the printed step-by-step instructions, I will immediately do something wrong.. Out of millions of buttons and items in different windows, you need to choose only one correct one each time.. Making an assembly in FreeCAD is almost as difficult as controlling a jet fighter..

[@xerveschex5761]

Every other cad program allows you to select features and place constraints. Freecad has too many steps.

[@MangoJellySolutions]

Try out the a2 plus assembly workbench. It's exactly what you are looking for.. I use this over assembly 4