Open-Source Product Development with FreeCAD

The established mechanical engineering industry is increasingly facing ever greater challenges. Costs are rising, dependence on other companies abroad is increasing, and qualified skilled workers are becoming more and more difficult to find. To counteract this development, I will demonstrate how the product development process in mechanical engineering can be implemented using open-source software. Among others, the software tools FreeCAD, PrePoMax, and LibreOffice are used. This significantly lowers the entry barrier for mechanical engineering startups as never before, while established SMEs can plan more independently and with greater long-term security. This is particularly essential in the current challenging economic environment. Aleksander Sadowski is the founder of ALSADO, the world’s first company offering professional FreeCAD support in the industry. He is studying mechanical engineering at the Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences and has been actively involved in the FreeCAD community for many years. Aleksander is developing a workflow for product development in mechanical engineering, fully composed of open- source-software, including FreeCAD, LibreOffice, PrePoMax and OpenRadioss.