Best (preferably free) software for tower testing?

[Baguette]

Hello, I've been looking around and most of the software seemed to be expensive corporate programs, designed for professionals. What's a user-friendly, 2D or 3D software, preferably free, that is ideal for this competition?

[Balsa Man]

The short answer is, there really is no such thing.

When you say 'software for tower testing', I have to assume you meant tower design.

Discussions and info provided in other threads here in the towers forum cover, in great detail, all the significant design aspects/decisions/tradeoffs you need to be aware of and understand. These include:
Basic shape and dimensions,
Forces at work in a loaded tower (what strengths do various pieces have to have to 'work.')
Wood testing and selection- how to test to get/use wood that will give you the needed strength
How to evaluate the trade-offs in the basic design question of stiffer legs with less bracing, or floppier legs with more bracing
Bracing alternatives, how they work, and how to calculate bracing intervals, with alternative bracing systems, to get needed leg strength.

This is all free, and here waiting to be read and understood. If you have specific design questions beyond these issues, I'd be interested in hearing what they might be.

As you have seen in researching "design' software packages, a) there is no such package specifically for ....small scale wooden structures. b) more general structural design packages are expensive, and, if you look at detailed info on how to use, they require extensive input data that is, at best hard to come by. Yes, some of the good 3-D packages - if you could get all the needed inputs right (like effectiveness of glue joint types), give the ability to do....dynamic analysis, like look at wind loading, look at failure mode. But, as you can see from discussion on this board, there are folk designing and building VERY competitive towers with the body of info noted above.