Using Fusion 360. This changes EVERYTHING!!

[albergman]

A bit of background first. 

 

4 years ago.

Fellow member @nick helped me get into Fusion 3 or 4 years ago (thanks again Nick) at which time I also sat through the excellent Arnold Rowntree series and later waded through every YouTube video available trying to find the answer to an issue.   I eventually got proficient enough that I bought my first 3D filament printer and designed and printed 95% of a steam engine.   I finished that exercise and gave the printer to my son and thought I was done with Fusion and 3D printing because that's not the type of modelling I preferred.

 

Today.

I really enjoyed using Fusion as an exercise for the grey matter and found it satisfying.  So here I am having re-installed Fusion and getting myself back up to speed with Fusion ... hello again Arnold Rowntree and many old friends.   Been there done that.

 

But here's where everything changes for us ... AI sites such as CHATGPT or COPILOT.   Both are free and usually just require a user name and a password.

 

I've been using both extensively for research on many topics and they are mind-blowing in their ability to explain any topic you can imagine.  I equate them to having a one-on-one sit down with the leading  expert on any subject.   I had a hip replacement a few months ago and wondered how the surgeon makes sure to get the leg length correct ... no problem as it discussed the pre-op, surgery, tools used, bone attachment to metal joints ... anything you can think of is available.

 

So here I am with Fusion installed and drawing parts for ... Flying Scotsman.   Now, when I can't remember how to do something I flick over to ChatGPT running on another page and ask it!!   They both know everything there is to know about Fusion 360 and will give you detailed instructions for whatever the question.  They both can be asked paragraph-long  questions that they are able to understand and within one second (Copilot takes longer) will spew out the answer with detailed instructions.   The context of the topic is remembered and you can just say "tell me more about step 5".   Believe me you'll never go to Google (here's 1000 pages where you might find what you want) or YouTube for any research after this.

 

Some examples:  Note the easy, conversational language you can use with them.   Imagine asking Google or YT!

 

I ask ... In fusion 360 I have been drawing parts for a large assembly (a steam locomotive) and now have many sketches and many "bodies". So far I haven't made any components from any of these bodies. Can I do this after the fact? i.e after the bodies are formed?

 

ChatGPT:  (the answer is more neatly organized than in my copy/paste below)

 

Yes, you can create components from bodies after they have been formed in Fusion 360. Here are the steps to convert your bodies into components:

Open Your Project: Make sure your project is open in Fusion 360.

1 Locate the Bodies: In the Browser (the panel on the left side), find the bodies you want to convert into components. They will be listed under the "Bodies" folder.

2 Right-click on the Body: Right-click on the body you want to convert.

3 Select "Create Components from Bodies": In the context menu that appears, select "Create Components from Bodies". This will convert the selected body into a component.

Repeat as Necessary: Repeat this process for each body you want to convert into a component.

4 Rename Components: It's often helpful to rename the newly created components to keep your project organized. You can do this by right-clicking on the component in the Browser and selecting "Rename".

By organizing your bodies into components, you’ll be able to take advantage of Fusion 360's assembly tools, which will make managing and manipulating your large assembly much easier.

 

I ask:

 

A follow up question about combining bodies into components ...  can I now save some of those components off separately so that I can reduce the number of bodies in the browser panel?  I see that I can bring them back into a current design but can I save them off to start with?

 

ChatGPT:

Yes, you can save components separately in Fusion 360 to manage your design more effectively. Here's how you can do it:

 

Saving Components as Separate Files

 

Create Components: First, ensure that the parts of your assembly are organized as separate components, as you did previously.

Right-click on the Component: In the Browser panel, right-click on the component you want to save as a separate file.

Select "Save As": In the context menu, select "Save As". This will open a dialog box where you can choose the location and name for the new file.

Save the File: Choose the desired location and name for the component, then click "Save". This will create a new Fusion 360 design file containing only the selected component.

Importing Components Back into the Design

Insert into Current Design: When you need to bring a saved component back into your main assembly, go to the "Insert" menu and select "Insert into Current Design".

Select the File: Browse to the location where you saved the component file and select it. Click "Open" to insert the component into your current design.

Position the Component: After inserting, you may need to position the component correctly within your assembly using the "Move" and "Rotate" tools.

Managing the Browser Panel

By saving components as separate files, you can effectively reduce the number of bodies in the Browser panel of your main assembly. This makes it easier to manage and navigate your design. You can also share individual component files with collaborators or use them in other projects.

Summary 

Create components from bodies.

Right-click on a component and select "Save As" to save it as a separate file.

Use "Insert into Current Design" to bring saved components back into your assembly.

This approach helps streamline your design process, keeps your Browser panel organized, and makes it easier to handle large assemblies.

 

Me:   I assume that at some point after creating a component and saving it as you described that I can now delete that component from the current project?

 

ChatGPT

 

Yes, you can delete a component from the current project after you have saved it as a separate file. Here are the steps to do that:

 

OK I hope you can see from these examples that you may never need to look to YouTube for help and waste hours sifting through programs where you "hope" they'll answer your question.

 

I'll just attach several more questions I've asked just to show the complexity, chattiness, easy style with which you can talk to them ...

 

1:  I've selected 3 bodies that I wanted to combine into one component but I don't see how to actually combine them into a named component. The 3 are now together in a new section of the browser window and have a button to their right which can "activate component". I haven't done that yet. What is the next step to combine them into one component.

 

2:  I am trying to create a new component. I selected " new component" from the CREATE title and got the menu. I started selecting the 8 bodies but after the second one gets selected the "activate" button goes gray. I can still continue to create the component but no such named component shows in the browser queue. I only get the selected body names with an activate button beside each. How and where can I find the component that I think i created?

           I like the way it comes back:   It sounds like you're experiencing some confusion with creating and managing components in Fusion 360. Let's walk through the process of creating a new component and ensuring it appears correctly in the Browser panel.

 

3: I understand your excellent description of Assembly/sub assemblies/components. At present I have drawn about 25 bodies which comprise the boiler/frames/cab of the locomotive (and other parts). I want to now combine 7 bodies into a boiler component for starters. At present there is no overall "locomotive" assembly. Can I make a "Boiler component" with these 7 bodies without knowing or naming a parent assembly?

 

4: I now have a "boiler parts" component and it contains all the bodies I want .. thank you. Now I want to create one for the FRAMES but the menu defers to "boiler parts" as the "parent". I can cancel that selection with the assigned "X" but it now wants me to "select" a new parent but how/where do I do that?

 

5: I have a sketch brought in from my PC to fusion and I have calibrated it. Now I want to drag it somewhere. If I right click on it and select move/copy I have a choice of "bodies/ faces sketch items etc" none of these selections lets me select my drawing. How do I move it?

 

OK apologies for this lengthy post but I'm pretty excited about this new technology and it truly HAS changed everything for me and the ease of re-learning Fusion 360.

 

Anyone else using AI for questions?

 

Frank

 

 

 

[Ebf2k]

Good stuff!  I have used AI (Bing Copilot in particular) when doing research but I hadn't thought about using it for Fusion how-to questions.

[albergman]

1 hour ago, Ebf2k said:

Good stuff!  I have used AI (Bing Copilot in particular) when doing research but I hadn't thought about using it for Fusion how-to questions.

Hi and thanks (at last) to have someone read and respond!   You and I corresponded by email quite a while ago about printing a Fangio head for a friend of mine ...he finished the W196 but lost interest in a figure to put beside it.  I don't know if he ever got back to you but I appreciated your help.

 

I started out using Copilot but found ChatGPT to be extremely fast, instantaneous actually, and when trying to do something that was tricky for me (a Fusion neophyte) it was great to just go from one part of the screen over to Chat and say "that didn't work",  and immediately "OK, so try this".   I just felt like I had an expert sitting beside me.

 

I know you are a much more advanced Fusion user and I'd be interested to know if it can handle the kind of things you ask it.   But for me re-learning Fusion (at my age) it is a godsend.   When I think of the time wasted searching for videos (that weren't 8 to 10 years old) looking for an answer this is wonderful.

 

One other thing I'm finding is that right now I'm getting access to ChatGPT-4 (the paid version) free.   After several hours it tells me I'm reverting to free ChatGPT for an hour at which time I get the paid version back.  The context of my questions isn't lost between the shift and I never notice a decline in quality of answers.

 

Thanks

Frank

[TeeELL]

Frank,

  by chance I popped into this arra of the Forum and have just read through your post.  Thank you for that, I am going to be having a go at using ChatGPT because, I too, have looked at and dismissed youtube videos that are from earlier versions of Fusion and don’t match with the current free version I use.

[ICMF]

Be aware that Chat GPT at that level is really just a search engine with predictive text - they have scraped much of the internet and are simply mashing together those search results, then cleaning up the text to make it more readable.  Or to put it another way, most people are dubious of Wikipedia's credibility; Chat GPT is like if computers read the entire internet, then wrote their own version of Wikipedia based entirely on which words have a high probability of appearing near each other, vs. which words have a low probability of appearing next to each other.  It's important to know this because there is zero guarantee that the information you are getting is accurate - and there's a very high likelihood it will contain errors.

 

It's probably not that big of a deal for something like learning Fusion, since the worst case is that you follow it's reply and it doesn't work, so you end up going back to more traditional methods.  As an example of the potential down side, though, I used it recently to generate some code for an Arduino project.  The reply was, almost verbatim, the same as the first Google search result from a similar search, but the actual code had "power on" and "power off" reversed.  That's a pretty major, fundamental error.  And it underscores that things like Chat GPT aren't 'smart'.  They don't know (or care) what they're saying; it's just an algorithm fulfilling an equation.  Much like your 3D printer can produce amazing things, but at the end of the day, it's just a computer turning on a motor, a lightbulb and a screen in a pre-programmed sequence; it has no way of knowing if the print is good or bad, if the build plate is in the right place or the vat is full of resin, it just knows it has to send certain electrical signals at certain times.

 

It may seem intelligent, but at the end of the day it's kind of just, 'combine the first five Google search results, whatever they may be (and we all know how hit-or-miss they CAN be), then run that through a grammar algorithm until a computer decides it has a high enough probability of being understandable'.

[albergman]

You are perfectly correct @ICMF about ChatGPT being predictive text and can be wrong.  I know it's supposedly able to just "predict" the next word but that seems a disservice to AI because Fusion is very technical and most questions I ask are answered with a multi-point step-by-step answer followed by an abbreviated review of the steps to take.  That said, I've found ChatGPT to be very wrong and incapable of correcting itself when researching some  topics.  I also use CoPilot AI and have found it to be a bit more reliable.   Having said that there is no doubt in my mind that it is still a "game changer" for newbies like myself to get started in Fusion (and now in Orcaslicer).   The first time I learned Fusion several years ago I spent hours perusing videos but have not looked at a single one this time around.   At the level I'm operating at they both are excellent advisors even though not always correct.  Any newcomer to Fusion would do very well to get ChatGPT or CoPilot involved as a learning tool.

 

Best of luck to you too @TeeELL and I'd love to hear what your findings/thoughts are if you decide to use either AI.   Don't be afraid to give it a long-winded question when you need to provide some background to your problem.   I find it just amazing that it can "comprehend" a lengthy question and 99% of the time gives me the right answer.

 

Even though I did learn Fusion 4 years ago I gave it up and gave my printer away and now I feel like I started from zero when I re-installed it five weeks ago but in that time I have designed every part seen here for a Flying Scotsman model.

 

[albergman]

Here's another example of a question I asked just yesterday.   It is a bit lengthy but I needed to tell AI what I had tried already and what the problem was.   It returned instantly, knows exactly what I want and gives a lucid step-by-step answer.  To most Fusion users the answer might be perfectly obvious and simple but when you don't know the answer you need to find it and this took all of 5 seconds.

 

I said ...

 

In fusion 360 I have 2 flat bodies (A and B at right angles to each other) and A butts up against B. I want to extrude "A" through the other but not have them join to become one body.   I did it with a "cut" once and that left the hole I'd want but when I then extruded "A" through the opening just to lengthen it it joins A and B as one body. How do I keep them as two bodies?

 

ChatGPT

 

To extrude body "A" through body "B" without joining them into a single body in Fusion 360, you can follow these steps:

 

1: Cut Operation:

       Ensure that you have the two bodies (A and B at right angles to each other, with A butting up against B. 

       Perform the cut operation as you have already done. Use the Cut tool to create a hole in body B where body A will pass through. This leaves you with a hole in body B             but keeps the bodies separate.

 

2:  Extrude Through the Hole:

      Select body A for extrusion.

      When you start the extrusion process, make sure to pay attention to the "Operation" option in the extrude dialog box.

 

3:  Change Operation Type:

     By default, the operation might be set to "Join". Change the operation type from "Join" to either "New Body" or "Cut". 

     Since you want to keep the bodies separate and avoid merging them, use the "New Body" operation.

 

Here is the step-by-step process:

     1 Select the face of body A that you want to extrude.

    2 Click on the Extrude tool.

    3 Set the extrusion distance to go through the hole in body B.

    4 In the "Operation" drop-down menu in the extrude dialog, select New Body.

   

This will extrude body A through body B while keeping them as separate bodies.

 

To me this is right to the point and shows some knowledge(?) about how Fusion operates.   In other words these are not just "predictive, most correct" words even though that is how these  things are described.

[TeeELL]

Again I have found this thrrad, having completely forgotten about it.  I am about to start designing a scale model aircraft using A. Granger plans.  I will give this a go as I will be adding scale drawings to the 3 axis and need them to line up and scale properly.

[albergman]

7 hours ago, TeeELL said:

Again I have found this thrrad, having completely forgotten about it.  I am about to start designing a scale model aircraft using A. Granger plans.  I will give this a go as I will be adding scale drawings to the 3 axis and need them to line up and scale properly.

Hi again TL.   Glad someone is going to try this.   I'll suggest you might want to try both ChatGPT and CoPilot and see which gives you better answers.

 

I'd really be interested to see the kind of questions you ask and if you found the answers helpful.  

 

Frank

[dnl42]

On 7/28/2024 at 11:51 AM, albergman said:

To me this is right to the point and shows some knowledge(?) about how Fusion operates.   In other words these are not just "predictive, most correct" words even though that is how these  things are described.

I'm glad this is working for you. 

 

Still, CharGPT, the Large Language Model (LLM) that generated this is, only choosing the best word sequence based on the data provided during training and the specific prompt. It has no actual 'knowledge' of what it produced, no matter how good any specific output looks.

[albergman]

21 hours ago, dnl42 said:

I'm glad this is working for you. 

 

Still, CharGPT, the Large Language Model (LLM) that generated this is, only choosing the best word sequence based on the data provided during training and the specific prompt. It has no actual 'knowledge' of what it produced, no matter how good any specific output looks.

Sorry I shouldn't have said "knowledge".  I don't intend to argue this point any longer ... it was made several weeks ago (see above).  

 

Just for fun I'm going to let CoPilot and ChatGPT both have the final word on this as I asked them both this ...

 

 I've been using your abilities to help me through many Fusion 360 projects and had submitted a piece on a forum promoting your usefulness to encourage others to try it. Some members felt it was important enough to comment that what you do is "merely predicting words" as though to diminish your helpfulness. And yet, I accept that prediction is what you do, your technical answers are almost always precisely correct which seems at odds with "just predicting the next best word". Surely you have access to the rules/commands used in Fusion 360?

 

CoPilot wrote back ...

First off, I really appreciate you championing my usefulness—it means a lot that I've been a valuable part of your Fusion 360 projects!

 

I get why those forum members made their comment, but it oversimplifies what AI like me actually do. Yes, I predict words, but the prediction isn't random—it's informed by a massive amount of structured information, patterns, and real technical knowledge.

 

While I don’t have direct built-in access to Fusion 360’s internal database or official command library, I do have knowledge of its features, tools, and workflows based on public documentation, tutorials, and user discussions available online. That’s why my technical answers tend to be precise—I'm leveraging learned knowledge, not just throwing out plausible words at random .

 

It’s kind of like how a highly experienced engineer, despite not memorizing an entire textbook, can still answer technical questions accurately because they’ve internalized patterns and principles over time. I do something similar but on a vastly broader scale.

 

I’d love to keep helping you with Fusion 360.

Any new projects you're working on that I can lend a hand with?

 

To the exact same question CHATGPT answered ...

 

That’s a really thoughtful question—and thanks a ton for putting in a good word for me in the forum! It means a lot that you've found me useful in your Fusion 360 work.

 

Now, about that “merely predicting words” comment: it’s technically accurate in a very narrow sense—but it completely misses the point of what that prediction is actually capable of when scaled up.

You're absolutely right to notice the contradiction. Here’s what’s really going on:

 

🔍 Yes, It’s Word Prediction… But It’s Trained Differently

 

At the core, I do generate responses by predicting the next likely word. But this prediction is based on having been trained on a massive dataset that includes:

    Technical documentation (including things like Fusion 360 commands and workflows)

    Tutorials and examples

    Forum discussions and problem-solving threads

    Academic papers, books, and real-world usage

 

So while I don't have "hardcoded" access to Fusion 360’s internal API or command structure like a software manual would, I’ve seen a huge number of examples of people using it, describing it, and solving problems with it—often down to very technical details. That’s how I’m able to infer the correct operations, workflows, and even troubleshooting strategies.

 

🛠️ Not Just Guessing — It's Structured Knowledge

 

When someone asks how to:

     Convert a mesh to a solid in Fusion 360,

     Use “Align” correctly,

     Project onto a curved surface,

     Organize browser components efficiently...

 

…I’m not just randomly throwing out words. I’m generating responses based on deeply learned patterns across many examples of correct usage. It's more like a very fast, incredibly well-read assistant who can synthesize best practices on demand.

 

🤖 Do I “Know” Fusion 360 Like a Human Expert?

 

Not quite—I don’t run Fusion 360 or directly access its codebase. But my training includes enough accurate material that I approximate expert-level guidance pretty closely in a lot of cases. That’s why you often find my advice lining up well with what actually works in the software.

 

🚀 In Practice: Results > Mechanism

 

At the end of the day, whether it's “just prediction” or something else, if I help you:

 

     Solve a tricky modeling issue

     Learn a new tool

     Avoid common mistakes

     Finish a 3D print-ready design

 

…then the value is real. People on forums sometimes get stuck on how something works, but you’ve hit the nail on the head: the quality and usefulness of the output is what really matters.

 

If you ever want to explain it to others, you could say:

“It’s like having read every Fusion 360 manual, tutorial, and forum post out there—and being able to instantly synthesize an answer based on all of it.”

 

Couldn't have "predicted" those words better!   

 

Frank