The 
TechDraw Workbench is used to produce basic technical drawings from 3D models created with another workbench such as Part, PartDesign, or Arch, or imported from other applications. Each drawing is a Page, which can contain various Views of drawable objects such as Part::Features, PartDesign::Bodies, App::Part groups, and Document Object groups. The resulting drawings can be used for things like documentation, manufacturing instructions, contracts, permits, etc.
Dimensions, sections, hatched areas, annotations, and SVG symbols can be added to the page, which can be further exported to different formats like DXF, SVG, and PDF.
TechDraw was officially included in FreeCAD starting with version 0.17; it is intended to replace the unsupported Drawing Workbench. Both workbenches are still provided in v0.17, but the Drawing Workbench may be removed in future releases. To keep up with TechDraw plans and developments, visit the TechDraw Roadmap.
If your primary goal is the production of complex 2D drawings and DXF files, and you don't need 3D modelling, FreeCAD may not be the right choice for you. You may wish to consider a dedicated software program for technical drafting instead, such as LibreCAD or QCad.
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These are tools for creating Page objects.
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Insert Default Page: adds a new page using the default template. -
Insert Page using Template: adds a new page using a selected template. -
Redraw Page: forces an update of the selected page. (v0.19)
These are tools for creating View objects.
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Insert View: adds a 2D projection view of an object. -
Insert Active View: inserts a view of the active 3D view. (v0.19) -
Insert Projection Group: invokes a dialog to create many views of an object from multiple directions. -
Insert Section View: inserts a cross-section view of an existing view. -
Insert Detail View: inserts a detail view of a portion of an existing view. -
Insert Draft Workbench Object: inserts a view of a Draft Workbench object. -
Insert Arch Workbench Object: inserts a view of an Arch Workbench Section Plane object. -
Insert Spreadsheet View: inserts a view of a Spreadsheet Workbench sheet.
These are tools to create and manage Clip objects (clipped views).
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Insert Clip Group: inserts a clip group into a page. -
Add View to Clip Group: adds an existing view to a clip group. -
Remove View from Clip Group: removes a view from a clip group.
These are tools to decorate pages or views:
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Hatch Face using Image File: applies a hatch pattern from a file to a face. -
Apply Geometric Hatch to Face: applies a hatch pattern to a face using an Autodesk PAT specification. -
Insert SVG Symbol: inserts a symbol from a SVG file into a page. -
Insert Bitmap Image: inserts a PNG or JPG bitmap image into a page. -
Turn View Frames On/Off: turns on/off frames and labels surrounding a view.
These are tools for creating and working with Dimension objects.
Linear dimensions can be based on two points, on one line, or on two lines.
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Insert Length Dimension: adds a length dimension. -
Insert Horizontal Dimension: adds a horizontal length dimension. -
Insert Vertical Dimension: adds a vertical length dimension. -
Insert Radius Dimension: adds a radius dimension to a circle or circular arc. -
Insert Diameter Dimension: adds a diameter dimension to a circle or a circular arc. -
Insert Angle Dimension: adds an angle dimension between two straight edges. -
Insert 3-Point Angle Dimension: adds an angle dimension using three vertices. -
Insert Horizontal Extent Dimension: adds a horizontal extent dimension. (v0.19) -
Insert Vertical Extent Dimension: adds a vertical extent dimension. (v0.19) -
Link Dimension to 3D Geometry: links an existing dimension to the 3D geometry. -
Insert Balloon Annotation: adds a "balloon" annotation to a page. (v0.19) -
Insert Landmark Dimension: adds a landmark distance dimension. (v0.19)
The annotation tools are for "marking up" a drawing with additional information.
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Insert Annotation: adds a plain text block as annotation. -
Add Leaderline to View: adds a leaderline to a view. (v0.19) -
Insert Rich Text Annotation: adds an rich text block as annotation to a leaderline or a view. (v0.19) -
Add Cosmetic Vertex: adds a Vertex which is not part of the source geometry. (v0.19) -
Add Midpoint Vertices: adds Cosmetic Vertices at midpoints of selected edges. (v0.19) -
Add Quadrant Vertices: adds Cosmetic Vertices at quarter points of selected (circular) edges. (v0.19) -
Add Centerline to Faces: adds a centerline to selected face(s). (v0.19) -
Add Centerline between 2 Lines: adds a centerline between 2 lines. (v0.19) -
Add Centerline between 2 Points: adds a centerline between 2 points. (v0.19) -
Add Cosmetic Line Through 2 points: adds a cosmetic line connecting 2 vertices. (v0.19) -
Remove Cosmetic Object: removes cosmetic objects from a page. (v0.19) -
Change Appearance of Lines: changes the appearance of selected line(s). (v0.19) -
Show/Hide Invisible Edges: shows/hides invisible lines/edges in a view. (v0.19) -
Add Welding Information to Leader: adds welding specifications to an existing leaderline. (v0.19)
These are tools to improve your TechDraw drawings.
Some of these tools have yet to be released.
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Aspect: select style, width and colour of lines. (v0.20) -
Stretch: extend a line at both ends. (v0.20) -
Shorten: shorten a line at both ends. (v0.20) -
Lock/Unlock: Lock/Unlock a view. (v0.20) -
Align Section: align a section view orthogonal to its source view. (v0.20) -
Align Horizontal: align a horizontal dimension chain. (v0.20) -
Align Vertical: align a vertical dimension chain. (v0.20) -
Align Oblique: align an oblique dimension chain. (v0.20) -
Horizontal Spacing: cascade horizontal dimensions. (v0.20) -
Vertical Spacing: cascade vertical dimensions. (v0.20) -
Oblique Spacing: cascade oblique dimensions. (v0.20) -
Change Aspect: change style, width and colour of lines. (v0.20)
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Arc-Circle Centerlines: adds centerlines to circles and arcs. (v0.20) -
Circular Series Centerlines: draw the centerlines of a hole/bolt circle. (v0.20) -
Intersection Point: create the vertexes at intersection of lines. (v0.20) -
Circunference: draw a cosmetic circumference using center and radius vertex. (v0.20) -
Arch: draw an arc rotating counterclockwise. (v0.20) -
Perpendicular: draw a line perpendicular to another line through a vertex. (v0.20) -
Parallel: draw a line parallel to another line through a vertex. (v0.20) -
Thread section Hole: adds a symbolic thread to the side view of a hole. (v0.20) -
Thread section Shaft: adds a symbolic thread to the side view of a bolt. (v0.20) -
Thread Hole: adds symbolic threads to the bottom view of holes. (v0.20) -
Thread Shaft: adds symbolic threads to the bottom view of bolts. (v0.20)
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Diameter Symbol: insert diameter sign as praefix character. (v0.20) -
Tubular Symbol: insert square sign as praefix character. (v0.20) -
Horizontal Series: create a horizontal dimension chain. (v0.20) -
Vertical Series: create a vertical dimension chain. (v0.20) -
Oblique Series: create an oblique dimension chain. (v0.20) -
Parallel Horizontal: create cascaded horizontal dimensions. (v0.20) -
Parallel Vertical: create cascaded vertical dimensions. (v0.20) -
Parallel Oblique: create cascaded oblique dimensions. (v0.20) -
Horizontal Chamfer: create a horizontal chamfer dimension. (v0.20) -
Vertical Chamfer: create a vertical chamfer dimension. (v0.20) -
Arc Length: create an arc length dimension. (v0.20) -
Increase Accuracy: increase decimal places . (v0.20) -
Decrease Accuracy: decrease decimal places . (v0.20)
These are tools for exporting pages to other applications.
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Export Page as SVG: saves the current page as SVG file. -
Export Page as DXF: saves the current page as DXF file.
- Line Groups: to control the appearance of various types of lines.
- Templates: the default templates defined for the drawing pages.
- Hatching: explanation of the different hatching techniques.
- Geometric dimensioning and tolerancing: explanation on how to achieve geometric dimensioning and tolerancing.
Preferences: preferences for the default values of the drawing page such as projection angle, colors, text sizes, and line styles.
The TechDraw tools can be used in macros and from the Python console by using two APIs.
- TechDraw drawings and its API are not interchangeable with the Drawing Workbench and its API. It is possible to convert Drawing Pages to TechDraw Pages using a Python script (
moveViews.py). - It is possible to have both TechDraw and Drawing Pages in the same FreeCAD document, as each page is completely independent from each other.
- There are minor differences in specifying editable texts in SVG templates compared to the Drawing module. In TechDraw the scaling of the SVG document affects the position of the editable text fields. See the forum discussion TechDraw templates scale for more details.
- Do not cut, copy and paste TechDraw objects in the tree view as this generally does not work out well.
- Basic TechDraw Tutorial: introduction to creating drawings with the TechDraw Workbench.
- Creating a new template: instructions to create a new page template in Inkscape for using with the TechDraw Workbench.
- Measurement Of Angles On Holes: instructions for adding centerlines and subsequent angle representations on holes.
- Miscellaneous: instructions for different settings like center marks, etc.
- TechDraw Pitch Circle Tutorial: instructions for adding a pitch circle.
Video tutorials by sliptonic
- TechDraw Workbench Part 1 (Basics), Part 2 (Dimensions), Part 3 (Multiview)
- TechDraw Workbench Part 4 (Section and Detail), Part 5 (Customizing Templates)
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