Serif Draw

[Saint Simon]

For many years I used Serif Draw to produce dimensional designs for laser cutting and general drawings. Having retired I am now trying to make similar drawings although sadly I no longer have access to a laser cutter.
My current efforts are to draw a clock face and I am finding the starter Serif Draw program I have managed to download too restricted and seem unable to upgrade. So, after all that pre-amble can anyone suggest a 2D drawing program that will allow me to make dimensioned designs for printing and that won't cost an arm and a leg?

 

[Droogs]

Try Gimp it is excellent and free. Used by many fretsaw users to make patterns etc. Have to say not heard Serif being used by anyone since the early 90s

 

[loftyhermes]

Inkscape is a free program, similar to CorelDraw.

 

[timothyedoran]

Inkscape is a vector program and will do what you want.

 

[thetyreman]

incscape is very good actually, but quite a steep learning curve, I still use a pen and paper for everything I do.

 

[loftyhermes]

There are loads of tutorials out there for Inkscape on youtube.

 

[MorrisWoodman12]

LibreCAD is another good free offering. Not too steep a learning curve coming from AutoCAD. I've produced several engineering drawings with it.
Martin

 

[Old.bodger]

https://www.plm.automation.siemens.com/plmapp/education/solid-edge/en_us/free-software/free-2d-cad
very good and reasonably easy to learn.

 

[TonyWs]

I use Serif Drawplus X6 for just about everything, from producing village hall event tickets, banners, programmes, dimensioned architectural drawings and plans for wood projects. It is brilliant, but no longer available, having morphed into a graphic designers tool. If you can get hold of a legacy copy of X6 it will run on Win10 fine.

 

[Sandyn]

I've been using Inkscape for the last few years, It's good, but it's a bit quirky to set drawing colours line types and stuff like that. Printing can be problematic. For some unknown reason the print comes out as one black block, so you have to add a white background rectangle. Never bothered to find out why it does that.
I must have a look at some of the options above.

 

[Saint Simon]

Spent the day getting to grips with the basics of Inkscape and have had my first attempt at the clock face that got me started on finding a replacement for Serif Draw. Very pleased so thanks to all for the advice.

 

[Wildman]

sketchup maker is free

 

[timothyedoran]

Spent the day getting to grips with the basics of Inkscape and have had my first attempt at the clock face that got me started on finding a replacement for Serif Draw. Very pleased so thanks to all for the advice.

Can we see a sneak preview pretty please

 

[Saint Simon]

Seems so simple now. Thanks again for your help.

 

[Sandyn]

That looks like a great face would you be willing to post the SVG file? would be handy to have the drawing for a clock face.

 

[Cordy]

I manage some elementary stuff on Inkscape
This drawing I used t make the truck wheels