Everything that happens after the model, inside Fusion.
Signal for Fusion is a SIGNAL tab with 15 panels and 43 commands. It joins parts, builds structures and kitchens, checks the model, calculates what every operation needs, and writes the drawings, nests, machine code, installation sheets and site surveys your shop and your crew work from.
We looked for a tool that does this for small and mid-size shops, did not find one, and built it.
Every panel, every command.
This is the tab as it sits in Fusion, panels in the order the work happens. Below it, all 43 commands sorted into the six categories, starting with the two every category uses.
Job Settings JOBWho the design is for and where its files go. Every Signal tool files its work under the customer and project, so nothing lands in the wrong folder.
Jobs to Quote JOBThe jobs being quoted, by the date promised. Send the customer a link to scan the space with Signal Customer, bring the scan into a new SITE design, and send the quote to the app: the 3D model, the customer drawings and the total. The approval comes back here.
Approved Jobs JOBThe jobs the customer approved. Build the layout they signed in Fusion exactly as sold, verify it can be made (processes, lead time and the confirmed estimate), post the stamped drawings for signature and read the signature back.
Part Numbers JOBGives every part a number from your shop's vocabulary: design, subassembly, part. It becomes the drawing number on every sheet.
Suppliers JOBOne folder per supplier: the files its machines read, its materials and calibrated values, its releases, your standards for it, and the drawings it gets, in its language, units and page size. New suppliers are added here, and the export board lists only these.
Lockdowel Router WOODWORKDraws and cuts the Lockdowel machining on every joint, with fasteners counted by joint length and one slide direction per part.
Dowels WOODWORKDowels the joints between boards, edge to edge or edge into face: how many, the offset from each end, and which board takes the deep bore. Cuts the holes.
Woodworking Exporter WOODWORKThe cut list with finished sizes, banded edges, every bore and channel, and a nest suggestion: saw, CNC or hybrid.
Supplier Programs WOODWORKMachine code for the supplier you choose: edge-band thickness and where it comes off, the Lockdowel fit, saw patterns and drilling files. Production, sample or calibration order.
Kitchen Builder KITCHENBuilds the kitchen from the room: straight, L, U or galley, wall lengths, appliance spaces and countertop. Cabinets come from shared standard parts.
Cabinet Fronts KITCHENGives each cabinet doors, drawers, a sink or an open front, with hinges, slides and sink from the library. Rebuilds the cabinets fitted.
Island KITCHENAdds an island: a single row with seating or back to back, its cabinets with a sink or a cooktop, and its countertop. Checks the aisles and collisions with the runs.
Library Requests KITCHENOpens a kitchen order sold in Signal Sales and builds, in a new design, each cabinet the library cannot make yet as a component to model, marked reference until it is modelled. Every request is recorded, so the library grows from what was actually sold.
Fasten ASSEMBLYHow two parts are fixed. The hardware follows the materials (sheet to tube: hex rivet nut; sheet to sheet: weld nut; into wood: insert nut). Screws are laid out on every contact, and the holes are checked, cut and sized.
Tube Joint ASSEMBLYKeys one tube into another, cut on the tube laser: through hole, tab and slot, bayonet, or hooks with laser-cut springs. Every tab, slot and spring is sized from the tubes, so they self-align before welding.
Sheet Joint ASSEMBLYTab and slot between sheets and plates: pick the sheet whose edge stands on the other. Signal decides the tab width and how many, places them from the centre of each edge outward, on straight or rolled edges, and opens a notch where a slot would sit too close to the edge.
Tube Fold ASSEMBLYA chain of mitred tubes made from one straight blank, V-notched on the tube laser and folded. Signal derives the blank, the notches and reliefs, writes the tube laser file and keeps only the closed seams to weld.
Unfold Tube ASSEMBLYShows a folded tube's blank, the straight tube the laser cuts with every V, relief and hole and the bend lines marked, in place or beside it. Graphics only: the model does not change.
Tube Profile ASSEMBLYModels each tube's outer and inner corner radius once the tubes are aligned, and declares them tubes, so the exporters, Fasten and Tube Joint read the declaration instead of the part's name.
Structure from Sketch BUILDBars and shelves from their plan sketch: ribs at every station, panels from the rings, modules that fit the sheet, one component per module design.
Register Style BUILDSaves a bar's construction as a style: the section at every station, the shelf and front profiles, the corners, its parameters and its weight per metre.
Build from Style BUILDBuilds a new bar from its outline sketch and a registered style: runs, corners and ends, the longest module your sheet, laser and brake allow, splits ranked by shared parts.
Flush Check CHECKFinds walls that do not follow the countertop above them, measured along their top edge, and can rebuild the wall on the outline.
Flat Pattern Check CHECKEvery bent or rolled part must flatten: arcs concentric and one sheet apart, thickness exactly the sheet-metal rule. Converts, rebuilds or makes the flat patterns.
Collision Check CHECKEvery pair of parts that occupy the same space: clashes, slivers, fasteners in their holes. Show frames the overlap. Nothing in the model changes.
Calibration CHECKEach supplier's own value for each assembly tool: slot clearance for Sheet Joint and Tube Joint, the Tube Fold K-factor, the Fasten hole offset. Writes the sample to send the supplier and saves the value their sample comes back with, so the tools design to that supplier's machines.
Signal Export EXPORTA status board for every output: current, stale since the model changed, or never made. Stale ones come ticked. Flat patterns, tube and sheet bends, weldments, torch access, 3D presenter and drawings.
Drawings DRAWINGSShop drawings from the last export: laser, bending, tube, woodworking and welding. Pick the sheets and press OK; they draw outside Fusion while you keep working.
Work Orders DRAWINGSMaster work orders for the open design from its last export: one traveller per part, weldment or panel, each line naming its drawing, packed with the drawings. Sheet metal multiplies by the units in Project and woodworking by its exporter's units. Without them you get an alert, not a guess.
Welding sequence review WELDThe welding sequence Signal derived for each weldment: the anchor, the sub-units built first and their order. Approve it or correct it with a reason; every decision trains the next.
Welding drawings review WELDApprove each welding sheet or record a discrepancy. A redrawn sheet is pending again, and the set is released only when every sheet is approved.
Company Standards JOBThe numbers your company works to: site clearances, front gaps, fillers, legs, substrate tolerances. Start from Signal's researched baseline and save only what you change.
Site Survey SITECompares every opening measured on site with the model, and builds a second model of the site as found. The design stays untouched.
Fit Our Parts SITEFits your pieces to the site as measured: sides kept clear, boxes and fronts resized, slides and hardware moved, doors and frames re-cut, then checked.
Site Installation SITEInstallation drawings for the whole site from each linked model's own export: the order across pieces, the room references and every piece's steps.
Survey Template SITEThe crew's survey drawing: method, equipment and accuracy, and every point to measure, numbered, with the design value beside a blank for the reading.
Project PROJECTHow many units of each linked model the project builds. Summaries, nests and plans multiply by it without re-exporting anything.
Model Summary SUMMARYWhat the model needs on one screen: sheets, plates and tubes, material to buy, laser by material and gauge, bending, tube cutting, welding, finishing and woodworking. One button makes a PDF for the supplier.
Planning PLANPlans a period: the jobs the shop will run, at their project quantities, nested together as one batch by material, gauge and finish, with a material forecast per supplier.
Static Simulation SIMULATEPick the supports and the loaded parts, set the load and the safety factor, and compare against a standard such as BIFMA. Reports the safety factor, the weak spots and the capacity.
Sheet Metal Nesting NESTNests the flat parts with your spacing, margin, rotation and sheet size, in seconds, without a full export. The export uses the same settings.
Wood Nesting NESTNests the cut list on the panel saw, a CNC flatbed or both, and compares 1/4, 3/8 and 1/2 inch bits by boards, passes, time and cost.
Tube Nesting NESTThe job's tubes on their sticks: every straight tube and every folded blank of the same size and material packed together, with each fold's split decided for the whole job, and a cut diagram per size as PDF.
From the model to the shop, in order.
Each step reads what the one before it wrote. Nothing is typed twice, and every output knows whether it is still current.
Say who it is for
Customer, project and your company's standards. Every file lands in the right folder.
Model, or generate
Draw it, or let Signal build it from a sketch or a room. Joints are declared, not guessed.
Catch it before it is cut
Walls that drift, parts that will not flatten, parts that collide, structures that are too weak.
Calculate everything
One status board. Every part, operation and joint is measured from the model and written to files.
Sheets, nests, programs
Shop drawings, nests, machine code and a batch plan for the period, reviewed and approved.
Survey, fit, install
The site as found, your parts fitted to it, and the crew's sheets, step by step.
Every command belongs to one.
Job Settings and Part Numbers come first and every category uses them. After that, each command lives in exactly one category, and each category has its own page.
Woodworking
Lockdowel, dowels, hardware library, kitchens, cut list, nest and CNC programs.
Open → ModuleSheet metal
What is calculated per process, joints and tube joints, and whole bars built from a sketch.
Open → ModuleSITE
Survey the room, fit your parts to it, and give the crew their instructions.
Open → ModulePlan
A period's jobs nested as one batch, and a material forecast for your suppliers.
Open → ModuleSimulation
Proof that it holds, checked as it is really assembled, with suggestions to build it better.
Open → ModuleNesting
Sheet, tube and wood laid out on stock you can buy, in seconds.
Open →And Quality, from every export. Each shop sheet comes with its balloon drawing and an inspection CSV, so the shop can follow its QC route without ballooning a drawing by hand.
See QualityStamping
Progressive dies, stations and coil, read from the model.
Machining
Machined parts with their operations, tolerances and inspection plan.
You cannot improve what you cannot track.
Most shops have no time tracking, because the information is scattered: the cut length is in the CAD, the weld in someone's estimate, the hours on a whiteboard. Nobody can say how long a part should take, so nobody can say whether it took too long.
Signal gives every operation a standard time, derived from the model. Signal records the actual time at each station. The difference is visible to everyone, which holds everyone accountable and shows where deliveries slip before the customer finds out.
- Laser. Cut length at the feed rate for the material and gauge, plus every pierce and every engraved mark.
- Routing and drilling. Lockdowel channel length at the router's feed, plus each bore.
- Bending and welding. Bends per part and weld inches per joint, split into tack and final pass.
- Installation. Each step built up from basic motions: lifts by weight, turns per bolt, lining up holes, glue wait times.
Drawn by Signal · from the Fusion model⤢ InspectInstall it on your next design.
Annual licence, billed in USD. Every export lands in Signal, so your parts and every correction are kept.