Today, much of the mechanical design has been completed before electrical design has barely started, practically eliminating any possibility of effective mechanical-electrical co-design. We propose an integrated MCAD-ECAD flow, harnessing generative AI to make mechanical electrical co-design a reality—to achieve optimal design and reduce turnaround time, design churn, and cost. We'll show how integration between Autodesk Fusion software and OrCAD X combined with Cadence's generative-AI printed circuit board (PCB) design solution, can transform mechanical-electrical co-design. The flow helps users achieve two seemingly contradictory goals: shift-left for mechanical and electrical engineers and shift-right for layout designers. In hours, mechanical/electrical engineers can get information like fully placed boards and thermal profiles early in design cycle, while PCB designers can start their work when the design is stable. This flow can help users reduce design cost and turnaround time, and create much more optimal designs.

Much of a mechanical engineer's time can be spent doing calculations by hand, checking schedules against layouts and schematics, and manually sizing pipes and ducts; this can be very boring, and is likely to lead to inconsistencies in your deliverables. Revit software has the capability to link your 3D model, drawings, schedules, and calculations all together in one place, saving you precious time that should be spent on designing rather than adding up. This class will use live demos and presentation material to showcase new features like analytical pipe connectors, and old ones like pipe sizing, treatment plans, and calculations in families. You will also see some examples of Dynamo scripts and add-ins that we have developed to speed up our design processes and add intelligence to our models. Real project examples are used to show automation from concept design right through to detailed design, including space data, thermal loads, system connection, and sizing.

This class will show attendees how to use the Fusion 360 3D CAD design app in the process that starts with designing concept models and ends with manufacturing ready parts.

We've been dimensioning in AutoCAD software for what seems like a century. You will learn how the multipurpose AMPOWERDIM command automatically recognizes objects and defaults to the appropriate dimension type. Discover how to create multiple dimensions with minimal input, resulting in instant groups of appropriately spaced ordinate, parallel, or symmetrical dimensions. You will also learn how to automatically force overlapping dimensions to automatically space themselves appropriately. You can use the same command to place linear, angular, radial, diameter, baseline, and chain dimensions. Learn how to integrate tolerance and fit list information into the drawing. In a layout or scale area, power dimensions automatically adjust their linear scale based on the points or geometry selected.

This session will explore a practical, classroom-tested workflow for integrating advanced electronics and mechanical design using Autodesk Fusion software. Using a mechatronics case study—a Raspberry Pi Pico-controlled NERF turret—you'll learn to streamline multidisciplinary design, enhance collaboration, and prevent integration challenges. See how Fusion can simplify electronics PCB and mechanical design integration, optimize prototyping, and support real-world educational outcomes. Gain practical methods for improving your electronics-mechanical workflow efficiency.

Learn how to create stunning models using unrestricted free-form tools and quickly transition from design to engineering all in Autodesk® Fusion 360 software from Autodesk. We will start with modeling a few design variants to get the overall look and feel of a new design and then start adding the necessary features to create a production-ready design.

Do you want to ensure the physical version of your electrical design has enough space in the mechanical layout? Are you tired of discovering too-tight bend radii during the first prototype build? Are you interested in keeping your mechanical and electrical designs in sync? Are you skeptical that any of this really works in a real-world environment? Attend this class to learn about all of this from real-life examples as they’ve been accomplished by your peers around the world. And learn why AutoCAD Electrical software and Inventor software are better combined together—just like chocolate and peanut butter.

This session will show you how to use Autodesk products for the complete electromechanical design workflow of a maker project. You'll learn how to use Autodesk Fusion 360 software for the structural and mechanical design, AutoCAD Electrical software for the electrical design, and Inventor software to combine the two into a full electromechanical workflow and wiring harness design.

AutoCAD Mechanical design software offers many drawing enhancements beyond traditional AutoCAD® software. Many of these productivity tools offer immediate benefits to manufacturing designers currently using AutoCAD. From standards management to documenting Inventor® 3D CAD software models, this class promotes 10 of the best productivity tools available in AutoCAD Mechanical.

This class covers the challenges and victories of a 100-year-old company that has transitioned from drawing on a drafting board to AutoCAD® software for 2D and 3D CAD, then to AutoCAD® Mechanical design software, and finally to Inventor® 3D CAD software. We describe how the company has adapted its own standards over the years to expedite the release of drawings to manufacturing in a very time-critical environment. Finally, we discuss how the company has decided to take technology by the horns with both 3D prototype/model design and a business enterprise resource planning (ERP) system.

During Autodesk University 2021, we shared a developed workflow for how designers can bring data together through designing the part, the PCB (printed circuit board), and even how to manufacture the plastic components. With the complexity of electronic part designs, there are often various aspects that we need to consider in order for the part to both work and perform as expected. In this class, we’ll demonstrate how the Autodesk Fusion 360 workflow has matured to incorporate mechanical engineering aspects to smooth this product design workflow. We’ll use a sample product, the Autodesk University Digital Badge, to demo how to integrate mechanical design requirements and simulation into the product design process.

See a practical example demonstrating how our customer Vimek AB integrates the built-in simulation and calculations tools in Autodesk® Product Design Suite as a natural part of their mechanical design process, starting with the conceptual phase. This class gives you easy-to-use-and-adopt examples covering free body diagramming, early conceptual dynamic simulations that will give you the most important sizing factors of the final design even before you have created a single new 3D solid! The class also covers how you use the reaction forces from the motion to perform finite element analysis (FEA) calculations and optimizations.

In many companies, the mechanical and electrical design are combined, creating a single mechatronic design process. Do your mechanical designs include electrical wires, harnesses, and components? When completing your electrical designs, would you like to use tools especially designed for creating electrical drawings? Autodesk® Inventor® software is the design tool of choice for the physical components, while AutoCAD® Electrical software is best to use for the electrical components. Using three basic guidelines, you can create a seamless interface between the two. We will explain these guidelines and how they work. During the class, we will use AutoCAD Electrical to create a circuit representing a wire harness and export the data into Inventor. In Inventor, we will create wires and cables and export the data into AutoCAD Electrical.

In this class, we will take you on a tour of Autodesk® Product Design Suite 2013. We will show you what you can do with this flexible set of tools that are specialized in 3D mechanical design, simulation, tooling, electrical design, visualization, documentation, and collaboration. Using the design suite tools, you can evaluate and optimize machines while exchanging information with others throughout the design workflow. You will learn what you can accomplish by combining the Digital Prototyping capabilities of Autodesk® Inventor® software with enhanced design, visualization, and cloud services tools to reduce development costs and get machine designs to your clients faster and with less rework.

Design engineers have historically been separated from the design process, using disparate tools to perform various calculations without using a BIM model in the early stages.  In this session, we will explain what the new system analysis tool in Revit is, why is important and the main benefits like being involved in the early stages of the project to perform load and system network calculations.  You will learn how systems analysis provides a fast, simple, and flexible way for a mechanical design engineer to define all the main components and a set of relationships that comprise a system, without having to physically model any part of it, following a more BIM-integrated workflow and taking in consideration how systems work in reality, how engineers think, and how design happens all entirely within Revit.

In this hands-on lab, learn how Inventor® Professional, Autodesk® Simulation CFD, and Autodesk® Simulation Mechanical design tools can empower structural engineers and architects to accurately assess designs for the infrastructure of our growing world. Autodesk design and creation suites are a smorgasbord of design tools, many with unlimited cloud computing capabilities. Creatively exploring various combinations and interoperability functions of Autodesk Simulation tools in nontraditional workflows can have a profound effect on design. This lab provides an opportunity to practice the workflow and techniques in a hands-on environment. A case study shows the techniques that are needed then justifies using simulation tools and workflows to accurately predict the thermal profile and resultant stresses through validation against measured bridge data. Attendees learn how Inventor designs can be analyzed for thermal loads using Simulation CFD and for thermal stresses using Simulation Mechanical.

A practicing consulting engineer will take a project from the schematic concept phase to the construction completion phase using HVAC Solution Software and Revit MEP software. See how the intelligent air, hydronic, steam, control, and plumbing system schematic models are used to convey and coordinate critical mechanical and electrical information with the design team. Both of these software systems used in concert enable your projects to be successful and profitable by providing precise and efficient mechanical designs and information to clients. HVAC Solution also accelerates project completion by automating mechanical system calculations and equipment selection through the phases of your projects. Because schedules and other reports are generated on the fly, the software enables firms to include information, diagrams, and reports on all phases of a project, thus providing clients with a high level of service.

What happens when some enthusiastic software developers team up with a few innovative mechanical designers? Henderson Engineers is an MEP design firm that’s been working on developing a modular DFMA (design for manufacture and assembly) air duct system for a while now, and has developed some clever Revit families and Dynamo scripts to help its designers model them. The firm joined forces with EvolveLAB, a building information modeling (BIM) consulting and software development company, to create a Revit add-in that focuses on the real-time generative design of these modular duct layouts. In this session, we’ll review how these companies used some unique properties of the Revit API to create a co-authoring system that allows a mechanical design to sketch out a main duct layout in Revit while the computer simultaneously and continually produces the most optimal layout using the DFMA kit of parts for that sketch—which is then finalized and converted into a fully connected Revit duct system.

In this class we will examine how 3ds Max software was used during the previsualization, design, and fabrication phases of a recently released short film created for the new Panasonic Toughpad. The final project had a fabrication schedule of fewer than 2 weeks. It features a machine spread over an area larger than 90 feet by 60 feet, and it includes everything from air cannons to live piranhas. The deadline was tight, and we will discuss how 3ds Max software was indispensable during the early previsualization stage; during the design phases of the various machine mechanics; and during the fabrication process using the rapid prototyping capabilities of computer numerical control (CNC) machining as an output device. We will discuss the process of bringing this project to completion, and we will examine behind-the-scenes footage and see how the project's technical lead, Kim Lee, worked with Paul Neale and used various rigging and dynamics simulation tools in 3ds Max software to speed up design of the several mechanical triggers and releases.

Are you starting with a blank screen? Or do you have a library of components? This is the top-down versus the bottom-up design question. Most designs use both. Your workflow should start with a strategy to get the most out of these styles of design. This class will dive into these different workflows in detail, using Fusion 360 software. Explore top-down design, including the body or component—what's the difference and why you should start with either; workflows to create in place components—starting off on the right foot; and when and how to reuse the designs you’re making. Learn about techniques for bottom-up design, including upload—what’s the best way to get large or small designs from anywhere into Fusion 360 software; file management via Fusion 360—keeping track of it all; design preparation—how to better prepare designs for insert and use; and distributed design workflows—inserting and using the parts you already have.