Customizing BikeCAD Pro

After installing BikeCAD Pro, there are a few things worth doing to customize the program to your needs. Let's suppose I'm running a shop called Bob's bikes and I specialize in mountain bikes. I might as well set things up so that it's one of my own bikes that appears each time I launch BikeCAD. We'll start by pulling up one of the bikes I've already designed. I'll click File >> Open design from BCAD file and select one of my favourite designs.

It's convenient that this design already has a selection of dimensions displayed. If I like to have these dimensions shown as I'm working on a design it makes sense to have these dimensions in place right away. While I may be fond of this paint scheme, let's suppose that my preference is to work with the paint turned off. We'll change the display mode from paint to hidden line mode. Also, for the majority of my work, let's say I tend to have the display of drivetrain components and water bottles turned off. I'll go ahead and turn those off now.

Let's assume that this is now the configuration we'd like to start with each time we launch BikeCAD. All we have to do is click View >> Customize and click the Save current bike as default template button.

If we close down the Customize dialog box, shut down BikeCAD and start again, we'll see that our preferred design is indeed now our default template.

But there is more that we can do to customize our copy of BikeCAD. If we return to the Customize dialog box, we should note that we can change the language by selecting our preferred language form the Change language drop down menu.

Moving on, in the Font section, we can change the font used in the actual BikeCAD interface (For example, the text in this very dialog box). This has already been demonstrated in the page called Changing GUI Font and Text Size in BikeCAD Pro. Below the controls for GUI font, you can also change the font used to render dimensions in your drawings as well as the font used in the title block.

Just below the Font section we have a menu for selecting the Look and Feel of the BikeCAD interface. This is demonstrated in the page titled Changing the Look and Feel in BikeCAD Pro.

In the top left corner of the BikeCAD interface, we see that the program is labeled BikeCAD Pro. If I like, I can rename it to whatever I want. For example, I could call it Bob's Bike Builder and those words would appear in the top left corner of the interface.

The text field labeled Key for saving online is where we'll enter our key. There's more info on this at: bikecad.ca/opening_and_saving_online.

If we're accustomed to working in BikeCAD with the paint displayed and we often have colourful backgrounds, we may not wish to have that large background filled with colour when printing directly from BikeCAD or when generating a PDF. By checking the Print white background box, we're telling BikeCAD to ignore our background colour when printing.

In the Print margin field we can adjust the width of empty margin surrounding our print.

By changing the Undo limit we can adjust the number of steps back that BikeCAD will remember. Increasing this number will let us undo more changes, but in extreme cases, could slow down performance.

The Scroll down to zoom check box should remain checked for the default scroll wheel effect on zoom, but could be unchecked to reverse the behaviour. There's more info on this at: bikecad.ca/scroll_wheel.

In the Builder info section we'll enter our contact info so that it can appear in the title block of drawings we send to customers. If we'd like to have our company logo appear in the title block, we can click the Add button to browse our computer for an image of our logo in BMP, JPG, GIF or PNG format.

If we click Save settings once again and restart BikeCAD, we can see how a drawing might look if we turn on the title block.

Going back to the customize dialog box, the rest of the check boxes in the Startup tab are used to remove options from the BikeCAD interface. Most users will want to retain access to all the options available in the program, but some may have no use for certain options and wish to simplify their interface by removing icons and menu choices from the screen.

Looking at the first row of options, these are all found in the top toolbar in BikeCAD. We'll note that the Zoom check box is unselected. Checking this box would enable a slider in the top toolbar that could be used to zoom in and out. However, because you can also zoom by scrolling the mouse wheel, most users will choose to leave this option unchecked.

The next block of icons are all choices available in the Display dialog box. By unchecking the second check box for any given icon, we would be removing that icon from the Display dialog box. All the components shown here will also have an eyeball icon Display inside the configuration dialog box for that component. For example, not only can the water bottle display be controlled in the Display dialog box but it can also be turned on an off inside the Water bottle dialog box. This eyeball icon inside the Water bottle dialog box can be removed by unchecking the first of two check boxes.

Some of these items are not actual components and therefore do not have configuration dialog boxes associated with them. These items include miter display Miters, Imported photos Photo icon, Toe overlap Toe overlap icon, Lean angle Lean angle icon, Problem curves Problem curves icon, and Auxiliary view of stays Stays Auxiliary View icon. Checking the first of two check boxes for any of these items will cause an icon for this item to appear in the top toolbar. Unchecking the first check box will remove the icon from the top toolbar.

The final thing to note about the Startup tab is the options available in the Paint tab. This is where custom palettes can be created and associated with any of the components of the bicycle design. This section is discussed extensively at: bikecad.ca/configuring_paint_palettes.

The Customize dialog box can also be used to customize the Fit advisor, and the exported CSV file but these subjects have already been covered in earlier videos. Finally, the Manage components and templates tab is where we go to remove certain components from our libraries of standard components, or to remove templates from our collections of templates.