Where is it all going? Claude – CAD – product

[Mike HurleyParticipant @mikehurley60381]

Just finished viewing the video of ‘what’s coming in FreeCad 26.3.’

One point that struck me was a post by ‘Blowlamp’  about Claude AI and Freecad. His key comment was “It seems that I don’t need to learn FreeCad after all”.

After watching the video that Martin had attached, I really wonder how true it is? Essentially now, from project to completed item(s) once you add CNC or  3D printing into the project stream, it seems that human interaction is now somewhat insignificant in many respects.

So, are we soon stopping calling ourselves Model Engineers and be referred to as machine minders / loaders?

While all of the wonderful tech now available is fascinating in its own right, does it mean that the hobby has simply come to a point where, like many things, the practical side is becoming legacy?

Not to undervalue the superb work done by many contributors to this forum. However, the dividing line between how much is actually done by the individual, compared to what the technology contributes seems to be reducing logarithmically in favour of tech.

It makes me think of Electronics – when I was younger, I spent many, many hours in a cold shed soldering together various things – from valve radios (Does anyone remember the widely advertised ‘HAC’  – Hear All Continents – kit) through the marvels of OC71 transistors etc and then Sinclair calculator kits etc etc. It was my Hobby, and I loved it! But now, as a pure hobby it’s somewhat irrelevant. Yes, some people still do useful bits, often cleverly using modern processors and of that ilk,  but mainly to directly fulfil a quite specific need. The technology has overtaken any requirement to just ‘make’ in many cases.

I’m finally thinking that the hobby we have all enjoyed over the years is finally becoming a dodo. In life, you have to accept that things will change. Whether you think that’s a good or a bad thing is down to personal choice.

Sorry if I’ve bored readers to tears, just one of those things I wanted to get off my chest!

Mike

 

 

 

 

 

[noel shelleyParticipant @noelshelley55608]

Dear Mike, I’m of the same opinion as you in many ways. Kits of the late 90s became ready builts of of the 2010s. If the stories about AI have any truth and I fear they have then the survival of the human race could end quite quickly.

Your reference to the OC 71 brings back memories of 1959 and a small radio I made, things progressed and by 1966 I had made a 7 valve  communications  set. Do you know why the OC71 was painted black ? Never mind, we do our best and plod on ! Best wishes. Noel.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

A decade ago some club members bought ‘fully machined’ kits for locos but found they needed a lot more work to actually fit. Kits are better now but it reminds us that AI and CNC are not perfect.
For a long time MEs have been using laser cut platework and several are getting parts printed that would have been castings previously. and soon this kind of thing may be cheaper than the raw materials at our level.
However can a robot assemble all these fiddly bits into a complete loco? There are complex consumer products coming off the production lines but those items have been specifically designed for machine assembly nothing like a faithful reproduction of an historic machine.

Now, where did I put those clear packaged OC71s I got sixty years ago for my model railway automation sensors.

 

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

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