Cabinet Sense for Sketchup

[vince mastrosimone]

I have tried to learn to use sketch up, but have not gotten very far with it. It just doesn’t come naturally for me although I can use V-carve 2D and lightburn. I saw an extension for Sketchup called cabinet sense and the video I saw made it look pretty easy.

So I have some questions and I need some confirmation on some other things I think I understand about this. From what I can tell it needs to run on a paid version of Sketchup but cabinet sense itself is free. As far as sketch up, the lowest subscription price I see is $119. I’m not a professional and I don’t plan on using sketch up or cabinet since very often. My questions are is there any less expensive way of getting a version of sketch up that will run cabinet sense? Is cabinet sense as easy to use as it looks in the videos? While I don’t plan on actually using a CNC to cut my cabinets I just would like to know if cabinet sense generates a cut list that I can use to build cabinets the old fashion way.

thanks for your help.

[Jim Allen]

If you are NOT selling your products, you can find a copy of Sketchup Make, it's latest version is 2017, when I'm doing any woodworking Sketchup Make has become most valuable. Google Sketchup Make and see what comes up. There is a free version for the web but it doesn't support extension.

[Jim Becker]

If the utility you want to use (Cabinet Sense...and I'm not familiar with it) requires the paid SketchUp subscription, that's what you need. That's the only way to get the application so it runs locally so you can install add-ins, etc. The free version is "cloud/browser" only at this point. Jim mentions SketchUp Make 2017, but that code may be very different than the current version. I actually had a problem getting it running on more recent versions of MacOS so when I was doing my shop planning, I bit the bullet and did a year subscription just to get done what I needed to do, as the free version wasn't comfortable for me for some reason. (I also use Vectric software so I understand the UI difference for sure)

[John TenEyck]

If you have been using the free online version of SketchUp, I can understand why it's been hard to learn. I am a reasonably proficient user of an older version and quickly got frustrated with the online version. I went back to Make 2017 which you can download for free. It meets my needs. There is an Extension you can install, also free, called CutList which will print out a list of every component, and lay them out on sheet goods or lumber, depending upon how they are labeled.

There are kitchen cabinet drawing plugins you can install in Make 2017. I found the one I tried too restrictive to be of practical use. Once you learn how to draw components, it's pretty easy to pick and choose the ones you need to make any cabinet needed.

Learning SketchUp was a LOT faster for me after I bought a tutorial. There are several available. I bought the one by Tim Killen, but there are others that target woodworkers, too. Following Killen's tutorial I could draw basic models after about 6 hours. Of course there was, and still, is a lot more to learn, but it wasn't hard to get proficient enough to develop models I could take to the shop and make.

Good luck.

John

[Mark Wedel]

Maybe there are better tutorials now for the online free version, but when I was first learning it, the online tutorials were the offline version, and some things were just different - I'd try what the tutorial said, and it didn't work that way for the online version. So like others, I just downloaded the 2023 version, and used that.

I've since used the online version for some smaller stuff, and knowing how sketchup works, it is OK, but the fact it doesn't have plugins, like the cutlist, removes a lot of the functionality. It can still be useful if you are not sure about clearances or how things might interact with each other.

[Derek Kessler]

Personally, I'd lean towards SketchUp Make 2017 for occasional use. It may not have the latest features, but it's reliable, and the learning curve is manageable. Plus, why pay more if you're not using it extensively?

[vince mastrosimone]

I appreciate the comments and suggestions y’all have made. I think I could figure out sketchup if I had a need to use it more often than once or twice a year. Maybe I’ll give it another go. Thank you for responding.

[George Yetka]

OP do you have any children or SO that work in education or are being educated? I wanted Sketchup and instead of the basic setup for 120 I got the full suite(1500 a year I think) for $40 or so. Im not doing business with it Im really just laying out the projects she asks me to do.

[John TenEyck]

SketchUp Make 2017 and the Cutlist Plugin are FREE.

To the OP, if you only need/plan to use it once or twice a year, it's going to be very hard to remember how to use SketchUp after those long lapses.

John

[Mark Wedel]

Remembering how to use sketchup is probably a personal thing. Before the ones I did a couple weeks ago, last time I had used it was a year ago. While I didn't remember everything on how to use it, I remembered 90% of the stuff I needed, and that remaining 10% was fairly easy to figure out.

The bigger issue is that if you use it very infrequently, is it worth the time investment to learn it in the first place. I did it because I was doing a fairly complicated project and doing it ad-hoc would likely have taken me longer because I probably would have gotten to a point where 'this just won't work' and have to redo a bunch of work.

[Jim Becker]

Related to the suggestion for SketchUp Make 2017, Trimble no longer offers this application for download and it's unsupported on Windows beyond v8 and MacOS beyond 10.2, if I have the numbers correct. The download may be available from other sources, but "officially", they have a page that says "no longer available". https://help.sketchup.com/en/make-access

[John TenEyck]

Related to the suggestion for SketchUp Make 2017, Trimble no longer offers this application for download and it's unsupported on Windows beyond v8 and MacOS beyond 10.2, if I have the numbers correct. The download may be available from other sources, but "officially", they have a page that says "no longer available". https://help.sketchup.com/en/make-access

It's available online. I downloaded it last year onto a new computer I bought running Win 10 and it works fine. Trimble stopped supporting it, but their support isn't needed.

John

[tim walker]

CabinetSense no longer works with older versions, only 2019-23. I have 2023 hard drive version and it is available for download. Here is the screen capture. 514839

[vince mastrosimone]

Remembering how to use sketchup is probably a personal thing. Before the ones I did a couple weeks ago, last time I had used it was a year ago. While I didn't remember everything on how to use it, I remembered 90% of the stuff I needed, and that remaining 10% was fairly easy to figure out.

The bigger issue is that if you use it very infrequently, is it worth the time investment to learn it in the first place. I did it because I was doing a fairly complicated project and doing it ad-hoc would likely have taken me longer because I probably would have gotten to a point where 'this just won't work' and have to redo a bunch of work.

that is what I’m thinking.

[vince mastrosimone]

I did download the free 2017 version to learn the program. I also noted that cabinet sense won’t run on that version. Maybe I’ll give it another go to learn it.

[Jim Becker]

It's available online. I downloaded it last year onto a new computer I bought running Win 10 and it works fine. Trimble stopped supporting it, but their support isn't needed.


Yes, it's available as I mentioned, but as you note, not supported. But there is also the security concern given the application wasn't designed for current generation operating systems. The link I included details this. I personally was not able to get it working reliably on my newer MacOS machine two years ago which is why I opted for a year subscription that I didn't renew for all the shop planning. It still ran on the old one, but I had to lend that to my daughter for while.

[Jim Allen]

Yes, it's available as I mentioned, but as you note, not supported. But there is also the security concern given the application wasn't designed for current generation operating systems. The link I included details this. I personally was not able to get it working reliably on my newer MacOS machine two years ago which is why I opted for a year subscription that I didn't renew for all the shop planning. It still ran on the old one, but I had to lend that to my daughter for while.
It works fine with Windows 10 though.

[Jim Becker]

That's good. Unfortunately for the OP, since the utility they want to use is not compatible with the old software, it's not going to help them other than having SketchUp running locally at no cost.

[Rush Paul]

I am a diehard 2017 Sketchup Make user on a Windows 11 PC. I was sorry to see Trimble stop supporting it, and sorry to loose access to the 3D Warehouse that will no longer work in it. But, I begin every shop project with a drawing in Sketchup. Within it's limitations, it is still a very capable 3D design tool.

To learn how to use it, I relied on several YouTube tutorials created by other woodworkers using earlier releases of Sketchup:

Jay Bates - https://jayscustomcreations.com/sketchup/
Jay Bates YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@JayBates/search?query=sketchup
April Wilkerson YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@AprilWilkerson/search?query=sketchup

There are some new series of YouTube tutorials that are good, but they use the more recent releases of the software and demonstrate functions that are not in the 2017 release.

[John TenEyck]

That's good. Unfortunately for the OP, since the utility they want to use is not compatible with the old software, it's not going to help them other than having SketchUp running locally at no cost.

There is at least one other cabinet design software that works with Make2017. I can't remember the name, but I'm sure I got it from the plugins. I tried it several years ago. While very powerful, I found it difficult to use and restrictive, so I got rid of it.

John

[vince mastrosimone]

Thanks for the youtube links. I will check them out.