Launch HN: Adam (YC W25) – Open-Source AI CAD

66 pointsposted 2 hours ago
by zachdive
(github.com)

25 Comments

dgellow

15 minutes ago

I'm pretty skeptical of AI products, but your onboarding and first design experience has been pretty awesome. I will definitely spend a bit more time experimenting with this

murkt

23 minutes ago

I find all current LLMs to have pretty poor spatial awareness. It is becoming better, but still very poor. How are you dealing with that? Got any special tricks, any advice?

zachdive

15 minutes ago

I write about this in detail here: https://adam.new/blog/bitter-lesson-ai-cad

This is improving greatly in recent model releases

murkt

9 minutes ago

Opus 4.5-4.7 was pretty bad at it, 4.8 was a bit better, and I have not tried Fable much.

So basically you have a good enough code that’s “intuitive” for a model, screenshots, and that’s it?

8note

2 minutes ago

fable is a fair bit better, but to an extent its that it tried more things to get an understanding of whats happening than opus does

dvh

an hour ago

I asked it to create 3d model of "AMF-O97L45-DB". It pulled datasheet and generated 3D model. Left is reality, right is what was generated: https://imgur.com/a/oNaz51q

- wrong pitch

- wrong pins position

- missing pins

paulglx

2 hours ago

It could be a nice touch to give some examples of what it's possible to ask CADAM!

zachdive

2 hours ago

Yes good idea! We've added a few in the read me if you'd like to take a look

jrflo

2 hours ago

Can you talk more about the UI for face/edge selection that you're working on? Is that only going to be in the OnShape/Fusion plugins?

zachdive

2 hours ago

It's currently in the plugins and we're working on bringing it to CADAM. Basically you'll be able to use the GUI, and give face/edge selection context to your prompt "extrude a hole through this face". It's directly tied to us adding brep support.

tapia

31 minutes ago

How can this approach be better than just selecting the edge and click the extrude button/write extrude command? Now you have to start writing a prompt and hope that what you want to do is understood by the LLM. I mean, CAD is really not so complicated with the tools we currently have. You just have to learn how to use them.

zachdive

24 minutes ago

That's more of an example to address the point. We've find our users often use this feature in our onshape/fusion extensions in complex assemblies. Being able to select faces and edges as context in addition to prompts can be quite a powerful interface in more complex projects where users need to adjust tolerances or edit multiple objects to prevent interference

_pdp_

2 hours ago

Very cool. Why not start with an MCP instead?

An existing LLM could drive the generation while the MCP can render the final result?

zachdive

2 hours ago

We're intent on building a dedicated editor, that way we can build a lot of nice UI! We'd also like to build public mcps for some of the popular cad tools

zardo

2 hours ago

FYI there is already a product with a very similar name, CADEM.

zachdive

2 hours ago

Oh thanks! What's CADEM?

zardo

an hour ago

I think it's primarily for designing chemical processing systems, though I know it through the pipe layout software being used off-label to design vehicle electrical harnesses.

q3k

2 hours ago

> A complete V8 internal combustion engine

Yeah, no, that's a lie. This isn't a CAD model. It's a fantasy 3d model that looks like it's straight out of Gearhead Garage (1999).

Any time I see these 'AI CAD' solutions it's always toys, toys, toys. Show me something functional that you've actually manufactured (shitty 3D prints don't count). Or at least show me something that can actually be assembled and isn't just a bunch of boxes with no fasteners to hold them together.

dgellow

8 minutes ago

> shitty 3D prints don't count

Why not? The 3D print market is pretty large and tools to generate some designs that can then be tweaked are pretty useful in that context. I don't think that type of AI CAD tool would replace professional CAD work, that's something that requires way too much context and human judgement. But being able to prototype something to be 3D printed via an AI thing is one of the few places where I see AI being genuinely useful.

I personally enjoy designing my own things with Plasticity, so wouldn't be the perfect target audience

zachdive

an hour ago

We could defo update our readme! What do you think of this?: https://x.com/aaronli/status/2064876123109089742?s=20

Fable 5 in our Fusion Extension.

sem4

an hour ago

not to say this isn't cool, but it's about as useful as having claude generate a JavaScript illustration of how a v8 works and then expecting someone to manufacturer an engine from that

For anyone doing CAD at a professional level (ie not 3d printed trinkets), the important parts are the physical parameters and tolerances designed into the model. For example I suspect your crankshaft would rip itself apart at engine speeds, not to mention all the plumbing, oil and coolant delivery, and auxiliary pumps and belts are missing

q3k

an hour ago

I see cams intersecting eachother and still nothing that is actually ready to be manufactured or even looks like a design that has had any thought put into it. It's the CAD equivalent of idle doodling.

Do you have a single person on your team that's actually a mechanical engineer with practical industry experience?

zachdive

an hour ago

Yes and we have a number of mechanical engineers using our extensions! AI in CAD is defo a WIP but when you trace the progress it's not too hard to envisage what the future will look like.

For the Fusion demo we intentionally didn't include the block or any accessories in the visualization as we wanted demonstrate Adam's ability to reason through the mechanical workings of an engine, like how the cams push the valves or the way the the crankshaft drives the connecting rods.