1A: Onshape Fundamentals - Section 1
Introduction and Setup
Welcome to Stage 1A! You'll be learning and practicing the basics of CAD throughout this stage.
This course is structured a bit differently from what you might be used to, and we hope you enjoy the process. In these exercises, you are encouraged to experiment and figure out how a feature "works." You can usually move on once you are able to complete the exercises. Exercises build on each other and always expect you to have done the previous exercises, so don't skip any.
No matter your experience level, you should start here. The time 1A takes to complete depends on your experience, because it relies on "figuring things out" to create connections and guide learning. It could take 30 minutes to an hour for an expert or multiple hours for complete beginners. The details you end up spending more time on are always going to be the stuff you need to learn or work on.
Warning
Make sure the required course tools (the part library and featurescripts) are added to your Onshape account before starting this stage.
Box Tube Intro
We will start off with Box Tubes, since they provide the primary structure of your robot. Box tubes are used in many places, from the drivetrain to the superstructure. They are strong, lightweight, and easy to work with. You will have to make countless box tubes throughout your FRC career, so it's important to get comfortable with them.
Example Usage
From the side, a box tube can be represented as a simple rectangle.
Box tubing is typically referred to by its size, eg: 2x1, 1x1, and 2x2 (Spoken as "two-by-one", "one-by-one", and "two-by-two"). For the rest of the learning course, we will use this notation when referring to box tube.
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1 inch × 1 inch
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2 inch × 1 inch
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2 inch x 2 inch
We'll be working with these increments throughout the stages, keep them in mind!
Important: Copy this Document!
Copy this document to use for all of the exercises in 1A. A tutorial is provided below to show how to copy a document.
Once the document is copied, move on to Exercise 0 using the page navigation buttons below.