If you have never used cabinet design software before, this information is important. It will give you an overview that will make the software easy to understand.
If you have used or been exposed to other cabinet design software, this information is vital. Understanding the fundamental difference between eCabinet Systems and the software you used in the past is “vital” to making eCabinet Systems easy.
There are different approaches to designing cabinets. The approach used in eCabinet Systems is different than the approach used by others.
The simplest, but most restrictive approach to cabinet design is to offer libraries of cabinets and allow the user limited ability to change certain parameters, such as size or number of drawers. Using this approach the extensive details of cabinet design and construction are fixed by the software developers who created the libraries. The only features the user can modify are those specifically allowed.
This type of software appears easy because of the limited number of things you can do with it and the fact that you can pretty much ignore the fundamental cabinet design process and simply select the cabinets you want from a library.
eCabinet Systems offers a program called Design Sharing which provides a mechanism by which power users of our software sell libraries of cabinets to other users. Those that want the simplicity of just using cabinets from a library can still work with eCabinet Systems.
We believe this approach has two advantages. First, the cabinet designs are made by real cabinetmakers. Experienced cabinetmakers will incorporate a lot of cabinet making experience into their designs that will certainly be useful to other cabinetmakers.
The second advantage of this approach is that, unlike other library programs, you can modify the design if you want. eCabinet Systems still remains a full function design package even if you choose to use other people’s libraries.
Should you decide to develop your own cabinet designs, you need a full function software that gives you control over all aspects of design and construction. Software that offers the user control over all aspects of cabinet design and construction, like ecabinet Systems, is by its very nature somewhat involved. All software that offers this ability, regardless of who supplies it, is based on a single concept. That concept is that each and every detail of cabinet construction is controlled by a parameter. Change the parameter and that particular detail changes.
Obviously this is more involved and puts more demand on software developers. The software should understand how changing one parameter affects other parameters. Some software simply ignores interrelationships, so if you change one parameter, a back for example, you must also specifically change any other parameter that is affected, such as the top it overlaps.
This is not the case with eCabinet Systems. eCabinet Systems automatically adjusts every parameter affected when you make a change.
There are two different approaches to managing parameters. Understanding this difference is important, especially if you have used or been exposed to the other approach.
The approach used by others is to offer an area where the user defines each and every detail of cabinet construction. All parameters are displayed and the user defines his or her preference for each and specifies how conflicts are handled. This list of parameters resides in the software and defines how cabinets are created.
At this point, cabinets do not exist. Once parameters are defined, you create a cabinet by instructing the software to create a cabinet of a certain size and configuration using the defined parameters. Parameters dictate the details of cabinet construction.
Although it sounds simple, this approach has two drawbacks. First, it is difficult and time-consuming to define all cabinet parameters before a single cabinet is created. This must be done when you first install the software. This is also the time when you know the least about the software and parameters.
The second drawback is that this approach tends to make it difficult to develop and work with a variety of designs. Changing parameters back and forth to create cabinets that differ from each other is complex. Also, you must actually create a cabinet before you can see the effect of any parameter change, so users tend to make all cabinets essentially the same once they find a set of parameters that work.
eCabinet Systems takes a different approach. In eCabinet Systems you DO NOT EVER create cabinets. Cabinets already exist. You modify, duplicate, and save them using new names but you do not create new cabinets from scratch.
In eCabinet Systems, the list of parameters is part of EACH CABINET not part of the SYSTEM. Although this sounds like a simple difference it has profound impact on how the software functions.
Instead of specifically defining parameters for each cabinet, existing cabinets already have parameters. To obtain a different design, the user modifies the parameters they want changed, leaves the others alone and saves the result under a new name.
The key ingredient to the eCabinet Systems approach, which really characterizes the software, is the ability to display highly detailed, accurate three-dimensional graphic images of the cabinet, including all joint and part detail while you are adjusting parameters. These images show exactly what the cabinet looks like with the current parameters. Changing a parameter causes the image to change, so you can examine the result.
This image can be moved, rotated, exploded and zoomed. Components can be hidden, made transparent or turned into wireframe. In short, the user can examine in minute detail the actual effect on the cabinet of any parameter change.
You start with a standard cabinet from a directory called “Standard Cabinets” and modify parameters until you fashion a cabinet designed the way you want. This new cabinet is saved under a new name in a new directory. The original cabinet still exists in the old directory under the old name.
The new cabinet can then be loaded, further modified and saved under yet another name. Now you have three, the old cabinet, the new cabinet and the modified version of the new cabinet.
This approach makes development of entire libraries easy and yet provides almost total flexibility.
To develop a library, start with a standard cabinet. Change it to include the parameters you want to be shared by every cabinet in your new library. Save this in a new directory as a “seed” cabinet.
Now, load this seed cabinet, resize and modify it to the first cabinet you want in your library. Save it. Load the seed cabinet again, fashion and save your next cabinet. In a short time you have an entire library of cabinets that all share the same characteristics as your seed cabinet.
Should you need to change any of these for a specific application, it is easy because the parameters reside with the cabinet, not the software. So, exactly how do we change the cabinet parameters?
To help understand, we might want to separate changes to the cabinet into three categories, size, configuration and parameters.
Size is well, size… height width and depth. This is changed on the Main page of the Cabinet/Assembly Editor but can also be changed whenever the cabinet is used in a job.
Configuration includes shelves, partitions, face frames, moldings, doors, drawers, etc. The configuration of a cabinet is developed through a series of Editors that are reached from the Main page or on the top toolbar.
The Editors use the concept of Default components or settings. This means that many details such as door design, drawer front and drawer box design, pulls and moldings have a “Default” selection so that they do not need to be selected each time they are used. When one of these components is added to a cabinet, the current “Default Selection” is automatically used; therefore using a specific design is a two step process. First, the design is located and designated as the “Default” generally using a Set Default button. Then, Then the item is added which automatically uses the “Default” selection.
Parameters are the little bitty details concerning everything about the cabinet. Material, joinery, fits, insets, and about everything else. These parameters are adjusted in an area called Construction Settings that is also reached from the Main page of the Cabinet/Assembly Editor.
There are actually two kinds of parameters, which can cause some confusion. Some parameters, a back inset for example, affect the cabinet as soon as they are changed. Other parameters define how items, a shelf for example, are added to the cabinet. Changing this second type of parameter doesn’t change existing shelves, it only affects shelves that are added after the change. Of course, to make it even more confusing, if you highlight a shelf and then make a parameter change it changes the shelf that was highlighted.
This is done for a good reason. It allows you to add multiple shelves and make each different. Add the first, change the parameters and add a second. The second shelf has the changed parameters. Change the parameters again (in doesn’t affect existing shelves) and add a third shelf. It is now different from the other two.
Each area that has this “add” feature has this same capability.
Despite this small bit of complexity, it’s actually pretty simple. Change size on the Main page or when you use the cabinet, change configuration using Editors and change parameters in Construction Settings.
Regardless of how many configurations and parameters the software allows for, cabinetmakers will always want to do something more. To address this, a Part Editor is available. Using the Part Editor, any part of the cabinet can be cut, pocketed, profiled or machined. This lets you create almost anything you can imagine.
The system also lets you import DXF files from other CAD systems and use them to either make parts or to cut or pocket their shape into a part.
The amazing thing is that all of these creations can be actually machined on a Thermwood CNC router from the file created by eCabinet Systems software. You can cut and profile individual cabinet parts pretty much any way you want.
If you want to put an edge profile on a part in the software, you need a tool file with the correct profile.
Tool files are available within the software for the profile tools that can be purchased through the eCabinet Systems program. There are also some sample files for asymmetrical tools that work well for making MDF doors.
You can also develop a tool with your own custom profile. This tool is developed in an area called a Shape Manager. Tools developed in the Shape Manager are used in the Part Editor to cut a profile on a part.
An interesting note about this feature is that once a profile is placed on a part in the Part Editor, that profile can be machined on a Thermwood CNC router, even if a custom profile tool for that shape is not available. The Thermwood control can create a modeling program using a ball nose and corner bit to machine the profile edge using modeling techniques.
If you are designing a part that is used on a cabinet that may change size, you will need to define how you want the size and position of the machining operation to behave as the part size changes. This is done in an area called Constraint Manager”. You define “constraints” and then see how it reacts as the cabinet size changes. You then adjust the “Constraints” until you get what you want.
So far it has been pretty simple but now we are going to add a valuable feature that can make it a bit more confusing if you don’t understand it. It has to do with the word “Assembly” in Cabinet/Assembly Editor.
A lot of complex cabinets and furniture cannot be defined with a single set of parameters. The approach eCabinet Systems uses to create these more complex pieces is to allow multiple cabinets to be loaded into the Cabinet/Assembly Editor at the same time and saved together as an “Assembly”. This approach is very powerful, but can be confusing. Let’s look at an example.
Suppose we need an upper island cabinet with a face frame and doors on both the front and back. We need to remove the back and put a face frame and doors on it.
In designing software to allow for this, you could create parameters for a face frame and doors on the back, but then someone will want it on the side. There are thousands of these variations and you simply can’t make parameters for everything or the software would really get confusing. Instead, eCabinet Systems allows you to combine elements from two or more cabinets into an Assembly.
In this case, we take our first face frame cabinet and remove the back. Then we take a second copy of the cabinet (we can copy and paste it right there) and remove everything except the face frame and doors.
At this point the software sees two cabinets, one without a back and one without everything except the face frame and doors. Move the face frame and doors from the second cabinet to the back of the first cabinet and we have the assembly we want. It looks like a single cabinet with a face frame and doors on both ends but we know that, as far as the software is concerned, it is actually two cabinets, each with parts removed.
We can address and change the parameters of either cabinet by highlighting it and accessing Construction Settings.
This is an important concept because this simple approach allows for almost unlimited flexibility and still offers the ability to address and adjust every aspect of every cabinet involved.
There are a couple of other areas we should mention in this overview. You can associate hardware, hinges, pulls, slides, etc. with a cabinet. When you do, the mounting hole pattern for the hardware is automatically added to the appropriate cabinet part. If you process the nest through a Thermwood CNC router, these hardware holes are automatically machined into the correct components.
In addition, the required hardware is added to a report called a “Buy List”. The Buy List contains everything you need to buy for the job.
As a bonus, you can buy everything on the Buy List through the eCabinet Systems program using the software. These sales fund continuing software development so you are actually helping yourself if you buy your components this way.
There is more to designing cabinets and assemblies, however, these are the important basic concepts. We cover all the detail capabilities in the Cabinet/Assembly Editor area.
While you can generate reports such as Cut Lists, Buy Lists and Cost Sheets (cost estimates) for a single cabinet, most want to combine multiple cabinets and assemblies into Jobs.
Within eCabinet Systems, you do not specifically create a Job. A Job is automatically created when any one of four events occurs.
- A cabinet is placed in the Job using Batch Input.
- A wall is created in Custom Layout.
- An item is placed in the Shopping Cart.
- A cabinet or other entity is placed in the Drawing Editor.
The reason this is important is that once a Job is created, it and everything around it can be saved as a Job (.esj) file.
We have two approaches for combining multiple cabinets into a Job.
The first approach applies to shops that build essentially standard cabinets in batches. This area is called Batch Cabinets and allows you to simply add a quantity of cabinets to the job by selecting them from your library. When all the cabinets have been added, you generate the reports and manufacturing output for the entire batch.
As we said, as soon as a cabinet is added using Batch Input, a Job is created and it can be saved as a Job file. At this point you can also run all the manufacturing reports for all the cabinets in the Job.
The second approach, and the one used by most custom cabinet shops, involves creating a room and installing cabinets from your library in that room.
In eCabinet Systems these functions are developed in an area called Custom Layout. Rather than combining all functions in a single Custom Layout area, the software uses four connected areas that make up the Custom Layout function.
The Main area is used for viewing the layout. You can tilt, rotate and zoom the room so that you can view it from any perspective. You can hide walls if they are in your way. The only thing you can do in this Main area, other than look at your layout, is to adjust the texture on the walls and floor.
Before you can view a room you need to actually create one. This is done in an area called a Wall Editor. Individual walls are created and the height and slope of the top of the walls are adjusted. Openings are cut into walls or sections added to walls in this area.
The Wall Editor works with entities called Wall Lines. These are simply lines that define the room.
Once you have a room, you will want to install cabinets. This is done in an area called Detail Room. This area is a little more rigid than the Main viewing area, but from either an overhead view or a wall elevation view, you load cabinets and then move them into position. There are several modes for doing this that you will need to learn and understand.
This area is actually quite involved and there are a lot of tools and techniques that can result in highly realistic representations of a finished room.
From the Main area, there is also a feature, called Presentation View that lets you create photorealistic views of the layout including shadows and reflections. These remarkable images are a major selling tool that have helped many shops sell their proposals, at times successfully selling against other bids that were priced lower. The highly professional image that this feature provides can be a great sales aide.
From either the Cabinet/Assembly Editor or Custom Layout, you can take cabinets, assemblies, walls and entire layouts into a Drawing Editor. Here, dimensioned line drawings are developed. This area also supports dimensioned isometrics and dimensioned, exploded isometric drawings.
Once the layout is complete, you can generate a Cut List, Buy List and Cost Sheet. If you plan to cut the part using traditional methods, you can generate a nest diagram, individual sheet diagrams, individual part drawings and labels for each part.
If you plan to run this job on a Thermwood CNC router, you can send the file directly to the control where it will be nested and machined.
We have mentioned Cost Sheets several times so now is a good time to get an overview of the cost estimating features of the software.
The system uses information from three areas to estimate job costs and there are two different approaches to developing these estimates.
The first input to the cost estimate is material cost. When you design a cabinet you specify the material to use and its cost. You also specify an estimated yield, which the system uses until you nest the job. Once the job is nested, the system knows exactly how much of each material is needed, the exact yield and exactly how much the material for the job will cost.
The second input to the cost estimate is the cost of components and hardware that must be purchased for the job. When you design your cabinet, you can associate the correct components with it. Since these components can be purchased through the eCabinet Systems program, the system knows the actual cost of each item and this cost is added to the material cost for the job.
The final cost elements that must be accounted for are labor and overhead. These costs are calculated from data that you supply about the cost structure of your shop. Using the information you supply, there are two different approaches to estimating labor and overhead.
The first approach uses historical ratios. It determines what the cost ratio for labor and overhead as compared to material has been in the past and applies these ratios to the new job. This approach works for shops that build a fairly consistent product line. If you build pretty much the same cabinets over and over, this simple approach should work well for you.
The second approach to estimating labor and overhead is to assign a certain number of labor hours to each cabinet and then assign a cost per hour to these labor hours. The system adds up the labor hours for all cabinets in a job and multiplies this by the cost per hour. The software allows for several different categories of labor, each at a different cost per hour, allowing for an even closer estimate.
To estimate overhead using this second approach, an overhead cost per hour is multiplied by the total number of hours in the job.
In the detail application of these estimates, additional tools are offered that can account for incidental costs such as shipping, scrap and the like.
This can be an important tool. Once the basic information bas been entered, cost calculations are pretty much automatic. You can display a running total of the job cost across the bottom of the screen and a Cost Sheet can be generated in a second window pretty much any time you want.
Several ancillary but important tools are also available in the software. These include an image control that is used to enhance jpeg images that can be captured from many areas of the software and a Display Part Editor where sophisticated textures can be placed on three dimensional objects which can then be added to cabinets or custom layouts.
Another ancillary feature is a Proposal Writer which is used to quickly create a professional sales proposal. This very quickly generates the basic proposal which can then be exported to Microsoft Word and further customized.
There is an area called Settings/Preferences. As its name implies, this is an area where you set parameters that define how the software functions. This is where you tailor its “look and feel”.
The final area we will touch on in this introduction is the Shopping Cart. This is where you can purchase virtually anything you might need directly from major industry vendors. The Shopping Cart is part of a Job and each Job has its own Shopping Cart. As we said earlier, the software automatically adds contents of the Buy List to the Shopping Cart (unless you tell it not to) but in addition, you can browse an extensive catalog of parts, components, machines and tooling that you can purchase at Member discount pricing.
You might note that as you work with the job and change things, the Buy List automatically accounts for the changes as does the Shopping Cart. Whenever you access the Shopping Cart, the contents reflect the current composition of the job.
And that is a general overview of eCabinet Systems software. There are a lot more details, but before you deal with these details, it is valuable that you understand just what we are trying to do in each area and how we get the overall job done.