I thought I'd try my hand designing some boards on the PC using some 3d programs. I downloaded the free version of Shape3d had heaps of fun making up lots of new boards. But I wasn't happy with some of the curves in the tail and the limitations of the free version I want to use another program to fine tune and work on the tail shapes, however when I tried to export them I found out I have to purchase the software which is fair enough, except as I'm just playing around at the moment $600 for 1 month is a bit too much for what I'm doing.
I had a play with AKUshaper but it has limited export options.
So then I had a look at Boardcad a free open source CAD/CAM-program. Website says it can open .s3d, .s3dx and .brd files. But it can't even see them on my PC let alone open them. Within Boardcad I click on open, go to the file my board shapes are in and the file is empty/blank.
Any people out there with some boardcad experience?
Alias AutoStudio. Mr Love will help you get started 
30 day demo:
www.autodesk.com/education/free-software/alias-autostudio
If BoardCAD or Shape3D works for you I would go that way. Using nurbs surface like Alias or Rhino create can be an issue with many of the NC machines that board shapers use which are driven by BoardCAD or Shape 3D. They cannot read Nurbs and I have yet to find a successful way of getting either program to read my files. A bit of a pain really.
BoardCAD can open the older Shape 3d V8 file type. In the free version of Shape 3dx, go 'save as...' then in the 'Save as type' box, pull down the options and save as 'Shape 3d V8 files..) BoardCAD can both see and open this.
