Opening dwg files

[rjohnson53]

If this is a duplicate I apologize. I have had NO luck searching for this. I installed FreeCad 20.2 and it runs fine. However, I am unable to open any of my existing dwg files. I have tried "OPEN" and "IMPORT" and both just give a "QCAD error". Trying other import types other than Automatic also fail. If I try and install OSD add-on I get many errors in the command window.
At this point I am not sure how to proceed since not being able to open my DWG files make the software useless to me.
If someone knows what I am missing/doing wrong I would really appreciate any suggestions.
Thanks to all.

[Roy_043]

OSD add-on

Which add-on is that?

[rjohnson53]

Sorry, I mis-spoke. It is ODA not OSD.
When I tried to Import using the ODA converter option under Preferences I get an error "ODA File Converter not found"
When I went to Tools/Addon Manager there was an ODA option and when I tried to install that I got all the errors.

[bambuko]

I haven't got 20.2 but using latest weekly I can confirm the same error message, yet... DXF opens perfectly fine

Code: Select all

OS: Debian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye) (KDE/plasma)
Word size of FreeCAD: 64-bit
Version: 0.21.0.32457 (Git) AppImage
Build type: Release
Branch: master
Hash: 85216bd12730bbc4c3cbf8f0bc50416ab1556cbb
Python 3.10.9, Qt 5.15.8, Coin 4.0.0, Vtk 9.1.0, OCC 7.6.3
Locale: English/United Kingdom (en_GB)
Installed mods: 
  * ToolViewReverse_ToolBar
  * DynamicData 2.46.0
  * sheetmetal 0.2.49
  * Assembly3 0.11.3
  * fasteners 0.3.40
  * ThreadProfile 1.81.0
  * Manipulator 1.4.3

[Roy_043]

There is no ODA add-on AFAICT. You have to download the ODA converter from the ODA site:
https://www.opendesign.com/guestfiles/o ... _converter

[thomas-neemann]

...

do you want to import 2d or 3d dwg files?

[rjohnson53]

I am trying to open 2D files. The other thing I wanted to do with FreeCAD was edit stl files and they open fine, as well as dxf files.

[thomas-neemann]

...

here is an example for 2 dwg import

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRm7cHF-Gpg

phpBB [video]

here are examples for dxf (2d dwg) processing


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uqq0kmOGLLI

phpBB [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyiWvBapevQ

phpBB [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQBKOEDAXgQ

phpBB [video]

[heda]

dwg is a proprietary format and thus not the easiest to handle correctly,
in fact fc completely relies on external libraries to parse a dwg file.

if you cannot make it run within fc, then these are the two options at hand:
a) run libredwg from command line to convert to dxf, and pray that fc handles the dxf properly
b) use LibreCAD to open the dwg and save as dxf
c) find an online converter to a fc-friendly format

in case of using LibreCAD, one can of course opt to do all modifications, this obviously entails learning yet another sw, but if you are often dealing with 2d from ad-sw - it could pay off.

[rjohnson53]

Since I can't understand any of the videos and they are very blurry on my system they are not much help, but thanks for the effort.

I downloaded and installed LibreCAD and it will not open the same files either, however it will open ones that are a much older version of AutoCAD. FreeCAD still won't open the older ones. I get "QCAD error" on the older ones also.

So at this point this is obviously something I can not do with FreeCAD, but I certainly appreciate all the suggestions.

I will have to try something else. Again, Thanks for the replies.