New Autodesk Formula Car Design Curriculum Available

[Jason Goetz]

Autodesk just posted a new curriculum that shows teams how to design their formula car using Autodesk Inventor. Exercises go from modeling basics, to assembly design, to using advanced component generators, stress analysis, and dynamic simulation.

The Autodesk Formula Car Design Curriculum is available for free download here: http://students.autodesk.com/?nd=formula_curriculum

Also, for those teams that need to do advanced FEA work, Autodesk has made their Advanced Simulation Technology Preview available for download on Autodesk Labs at http://labs.autodesk.com/technologies/advanced_simulation/. This is the same technology that Autodesk acquired from Plassotech, originally called Plassotech 3G.author. Note that this Technology Preview only works if you have an installed license of Autodesk Inventor. So, if you don't have Inventor already, you can download it for free from the Autodesk Student Community: http://students.autodesk.com/?nd=m_downloads

Check out the new curriculum materials, and feel free to contact me at jason.goetz@autodesk.com if you have any questions.

Thanks,

[Jason Goetz]

Autodesk just posted a new curriculum that shows teams how to design their formula car using Autodesk Inventor. Exercises go from modeling basics, to assembly design, to using advanced component generators, stress analysis, and dynamic simulation.

The Autodesk Formula Car Design Curriculum is available for free download here: http://students.autodesk.com/?nd=formula_curriculum

Also, for those teams that need to do advanced FEA work, Autodesk has made their Advanced Simulation Technology Preview available for download on Autodesk Labs at http://labs.autodesk.com/technologies/advanced_simulation/. This is the same technology that Autodesk acquired from Plassotech, originally called Plassotech 3G.author. Note that this Technology Preview only works if you have an installed license of Autodesk Inventor. So, if you don't have Inventor already, you can download it for free from the Autodesk Student Community: http://students.autodesk.com/?nd=m_downloads

Check out the new curriculum materials, and feel free to contact me at jason.goetz@autodesk.com if you have any questions.

Thanks,

[Aaron@Kaist]

this program is full of bugs

[Anvit Garg]

I think its awesome. This is perfect to train the engineers on my team to use a CAD software as well as apply it directly to the goal!

I have completed a few lessons have had it be made available to my entire team.

I guess in reply to Aaron@Kaist, if you are talking about Inventor 2009, then yes I agree there are some odd bugs, most of us had problems just downloading the files to extract the program. When I installed my copy, it left an invalid license that I could not find and would not activate. I ended up having to reformat my computer to get Inventor to work. I am just hoping it doesnt pop up with another license error again. It seems to be working fine for now.

But we really appreciate the generosity of Autodesk and could not have asked for half of what they have given us.

[Aaron@Kaist]

i guess im on the same track, just reformated my computer...still not working. I manually extracted the files, but now the formula tutorials are not working! what to do...Anyways hope everything works out fine for you. I agree it is a fantastic program tho, if it worked fine

[Anvit Garg]

Aaron: Are you trying this for 32 bit or 64? Vista or XP?

When you download the files, use firefox or something with a resume feature, when I tried to download those large files in IE7, it kept stopping early when I was logged off the server due to inactivity.

And when you say not working, do you mean the program still wont install or it installs fine but gives you a specific error? i.e. [5.-97] or something with numbers.

Also dont forget to download the SP1 (service pack 1) off autodesk's support site.

[Anvit Garg]

It keeps giving me can not obtain license errors!!

I think I figured out a workaround: In the Bin directory there is a program called ad32lw.exe and it is possible vista is blocking it, so when i double click that, and then run Inventor, it works!

Lets see how long that lasts though...I cant find a permanent solution for this problem anywhere. And I dont want to upgrade to XP since i have 8GB of ram.

[carbon_black]

I was unable to download either of the 32bit or 32+64 bit 2009 versions off the website, both with the automatic community tool, or the straight .rar files. Every single time they downloaded they would either fail CRC checks, or simply not unzip.

In regards to the Curriculum though, it looks promising. Thank you for publishing it.

[Anvit Garg]

are you downloading from internet explorer or a browser that allow you to pause/resume downloads?

Make sure you stay logged into the students website during the entire download.

[Jason Goetz]

As an update to the problems you were experiencing with downloading Inventor, Autodesk recently posted a new build of Inventor that is smaller in size and should alleviate the errors you were getting with installation.

[Anvit Garg]

Hello:

I was wondering if you are familiar with the licensing issue. I have to manually go into my inventor directory and double click on ad32lw.exe or else I get a license error.

I have tried to reformat, reinstall etc numerous times. I do not see this problem with a 32 bit install, but only on 64 bit.

I had uninstalled the 32 bit off my laptop before trying the 64 on my desktop.