Kevin-the-lubber

Coming along nicely. Everything fits +/- a bit of clearance adjustment. I keep breaking that thin wispy decor on the lower counter, that'll be one where I make plenty of spares. Looks like I lost a bit of fairness on the lower window bottom profile; now that one will be a pain to fix so I think I'll see whether it shows when painted and in situ.

Yes, I like that too. Unfortunately you only get it running horizontal to the print, whereas all the areas I can think of where it would make a nice feature - masts, the hull, the boats - would be better printed vertical, with this graining running 90 degrees out.

Just the basic lofting process here, sample file attached. (with so few steps I haven't bothered to name things....!) 1. Create sketch, select top 2. Draw one half of the deck shape using a fit point spline. This is going to be the guide rail for lofting so you only need the outer deck edge. Note, you need a continuous line, otherwise you’ll have problems when lofting, so run that spline point to point and use the handles to get a straight side shape. Don’t mirror, not needed. Close sketch 3. Construct an offset plane 30mm below the deck plane 4. Create a sketch on the new plane. Project the deck rail from the deck plane but don’t link. Offset the projected rail by (10mm in sample) to get the mid-level hull profile. Tip – trim the overshoots (T on the keyboard). This will break the offset constraint but that’s not a problem. Close sketch 5. Create a side view sketch using the front plane (this will be on the hull centreline). Draw a keel line, whatever you want. Make sketches 1 & 2 visible and join the bow point to mid-level bow point with a line. Draw another line to the keel line. Close in the top and stern end, to create a closed profile. Close the sketch 6. Construct an offset plane in the left view. Offset by 100mm. This is the stern plane. Draw a sketch joining the deck to mid-plane to keel. Ensure it’s a closed profile. 7. Loft the stern to side profiles using the deck rail as a guide. Mirror if you wish. chine hull v0.f3d

Small victories are always welcome.... forgive the pun. On the first mock-up some months back I couldn't get all the letters on the signboard to sit down in their sockets so that they all protruded by exactly the same amount. Turns out you get a lip on bottom of resin prints when these are flat on the print plate, as opposed to being on supports. You'd have to look carefully to notice it on bigger parts, but it's there. Supporting the letters isn't an option, some webs are probably only 0.2mm thick. So, easy solution: print the letters taller than needed, make a little reverse image sanding jig with the correct end depth and sand until flush. I must have increased the socket clearance on the upper counter at some point, as a solution. As there is now a little too much clearance I will either adjust this backwards for the final model or just increase the size of the letters by 0.1mm. I will also be making a reverse version of the jig, for when I airbrush; I learned too that you don't want to get any paint on the sides, you can easily add 0.2mm with that. These are very quick and easy operations. Getting the clearances right is everything on this project, because the tolerances are necessarily very fine. I don't want gaps where parts meet and in many areas the overlap is constrained to only 0.2mm, about the thickness of a sheet of paper, just enough to hide the join but no room for error. You'll notice a bulge on the middle windows; I reduced the clearance by 0.1mm since the mock-up, but this has changed it from clearance to interference fit. Again, 5 minutes to fix now that the whole kit is modelled. You may also notice the lower scroll and figurine, I've incorporated these into the middle window component as it 'fixes' their position, likewise I've incorporated the upper scroll into the serrated decor above the top window, but more on these will follow presently. With a little luck I'll be posting in technicolor by the end of the week!

Tell me about it! I’ve gone through a fair few FEP’s through bad judgement and still have cold sweats whenever I’m trying something marginal! I wouldn’t be anywhere near brave enough to have so few supports as you, Paul, at least not with 40 or 50 cannons on the plate. To be honest I’m not sure what benefit there is in angling these cannon (but am very open to being educated). Whether plumb vertical or angled, you’re going to have an annulus pulling on the FEP, in effect a suction cup, and the only gain I can see in angling would be to more naturally put a few supports up the hidden side of the barrel. Please do tell me if I’ve missed something though, FEP is expensive! In passing, I bought the large Anycubic wash and cure machine a couple of weeks ago and used it for the first time yesterday. What a joy, I’ve gone from a tedious, quite messy wash process to something quick, clean and easy. It’s also great for washing out the vats when changing resin - I’ve been using up some standard resin but wanted to switch to ABS for the current run.

Thank you gents, much appreciated. It makes a very welcome change to be back to scraping and sanding after too many months staring at the screen. Marc, you’d enjoy this bit. The resin is quite like evergreen in workability, it’s easy to scrape off little lumps and bumps and sculpt. Ian, you’re very determined to get me doing a hull, aren’t you! And I have to admit that the back of my mind is churning away at the Victory hull. The basic thing doesn’t look that difficult but I think I would need a second copy of McKay, to break apart in order to get dead flat scans of the profiles. Mark, I saw Daniel’s beautiful new side steps yesterday, this is probably next on my list but I may take a bit of a break first, the stern has been a little all consuming, bordering on the unhealthy.

I haven’t tried any colours at all, always gone grey as everyone says it’s the easiest for seeing the detail before painting. I was thinking of getting some brown for making blocks etc, but maybe black is worth a go. It certainly has a nice look to it. I’ve just begun a new run of printing and, oddly enough, the elegoo ABS-like is coming out a bit softer than previous batches. So I wonder if mixing resins was, after all, quite a good thing to do. I only did it because they were test prints and the end result didn’t matter, but I think I’ll try a standard and abs mix again shortly, and be more scientific this time. Out of interest, presumably you printed the cannons vertically, with supports on the muzzle? Any issues with that? I had planned on printing vertically with the muzzle flat on the plate, to avoid support dimples, but am conscious that there’s nowhere for the resin to drain from the barrel.

All’s gone well this evening. I need to rethink using locating pins, at 0.8mm they are too hard to distinguish from supports. But I think I’ll have a lie in tomorrow! A master - nowhere near it I’m afraid, when you see the skills of the pro’s. I’m just becoming more and more stubborn with age 😀!

Thanks Marc. I'm not entirely there yet - the print currently underway is the acid test (the windows, figurine, scrolls), but if it all goes together as planned I'll have a very nice, happy and long sleep tonight.

I've used it extensively - bear in mind that thread is several years old.

Try this; https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/fusion-360-design-validate/how-to-draw-a-boat-hull/td-p/6428751. I always listen to what Peter Doering says, he knows his stuff. You'll find examples in the thread which might be useful - I haven't looked but some of the lofts on my stern follow the same principles. Personally I wouldn't go near forms for this, and I only use surfaces when lofting or sweeping aren't possible.

Probably the trickiest part to print, the main body.... Resin printing is fabulous for detail but, as with all things in life, you can't have everything. Hence the inside (second photo) looks like it's had the Intrepide or Redoutable lobbing 24 pounders down the length of every deck all day long. This is the underside when printing, to which all the supports attach. My priority is to try to keep the visible outside edges as sharp as possible, especially the very top and the letters, at the expense of the interior. This is a test fit directly after removing all the supports and before cleaning up. I've built in the benches in the captain and admiral's quarters, as well as the quarter gallery floors (with en suite's of course), to give added rigidity and assist with fitting. Between them, the benches and floors lightly pinch the hull sides such that the whole thing sits in place without glue. Though the lower floor needs moving up a foot or two, you'd be needing a ladder in real life. All that mess in the third picture is the printing supports. More resin goes into these than in the part itself, but I've learned to go big rather than penny pinch. I think somewhere in that pile is the lower gallery decor I made a couple of days ago 😂... I tested it for fit ( fits nicely) but can't find it now so assume I scooped it up when tidying up. The only area that will, I think, need more than the lightest filling will be where the lower counter meets the hull. It's as good a fit as the kit part, which isn't saying much! The gap won't be as big as the picture suggests, just a little where the hull halves don't quite match.

I just got a chance to try the same thing (projecting the curves) myself, today, as I haven't used the project>intersection function, but as you say, it doesn't do the same as the solidworks equivalent. Pity, there are places where this would be useful. I think the best way to do this in F360 is through lofting with guide rails. The workflow would look something like this; 1. Draw the half deck view. You will only really need the outside edge, as a lofting guide rail. 2. Draw the side view. for the sake of simplicity here, keep the top edge straight and horizontal. make sure the sketch is closed (extrudable) 3. Draw the half stern view. Again, for simplicity's sake, make the top edge horizontal. (make sure the sketch is closed (extrudable) 4. loft the end to the side using the deck edge as a guide rail. This will give you a solid half. You could just as easily offset the hull edges to give a thickness and loft these. For what it's worth, I sometimes get tied in knots when lofting, with profiles apparently intersecting etc. And in passing, I sometimes get problems when combining complex shapes; I mention this because I use the same solution for both - I move one adjoining line either back from (lofting), or further into (combining) the other by typically 0.01mm. This usually does the trick. This issue has been very common, for me, when doing a '90 degree' type loft where the sections have a common line.

Thanks Marc, the hilarious thing is that this all started out as a way to have a break from my unsatisfactory and frustrating efforts to model the side steps - I thought I'd spend a week painting the stern from the kit, which looked interesting, while awaiting inspiration for a better way to do the steps. Until I found it impossible to paint the balustrades.... 😃. You'd have just got on with it! But it's got me to learn basic 3D modelling and the side steps should be much easier to get right, now. I know I can still improve on some bits of the stern, I could probably easily 'etch' this part a little more for instance, but at least I now have a fair base to work from if I get the inclination and, once I get the printing setups right, it's easy to make changes. I still haven't got a trophy that I'm happy with but will leave that for another day, nor touched the lanterns, which don't look so hard.

Half of this conversation sounds like etruscan to me.... jeers, thimbles, futtocks.. Which probably gives you an indication of how I'm getting on with Longridge, Bill. I like the drawings though. Look, it's simple. You just send it to me when ready, I'll stick it in my garage, after a month the resident spiders will have it covered in silken strings so fine and taut you'll be the envy of the entire forum.

It does hint at those round inflatable lifeboats on modern ships... does it have a quick release mechanism somewhere😊? In any case, plenty to hang onto once in the water....

Big day for me.... I essentially finished the stern modelling today, at least as far as I'll go with it for now. I have a printing marathon ahead... there are 39 parts to this 'mini-kit' and each one requires a lot of patience to set up for a good print, and no doubt some things will need a little fiddling. Here's the first off the press today, the fine decor at the bottom of the quarter galleries and lower counter, in this instance resting on the dummy body I made a couple of months back. Far from being an exact replica but I think it'll do. It's also the first time I've managed to do something using meshmixer, which I used to add the lines on the leaves.

Ah, now it makes sense. I knew there would be a good reason for it. Wow, that's a big platform, roomier than I thought. Sadly no longer present on VoP.

Neither, I mean the infill battens (or whatever they would be called) arrowed below. These days I imagine they'd be called a trip hazard :-). I realise these platforms were not for the faint-hearted and tripping was probably the least of your worries when someone was blasting cannonballs at the lower mast, but there must have been a reason they weren't just planked on top to create a flat working surface? (Meanwhile, I'm eyeing up the carbon fibre rods on my daughters old kite and thinking, would she ever miss it..... would she ever know.....)

On a different note, one of idle curiosity. Do you know why the fighting tops had the planking underneath the ‘joists’? I’m sure there was a good, logical reason for that.

That’s an interesting and unexpected change in properties!

I’m sure you would do this anyway but it’s worth mentioning at least two things here for beginners (I of course learned the hard way!). - make sure, when you create these planes, that the hull component is active (radio button checked), not the root. Otherwise It is an utter pain, down the line, to be trying to remember where things are. - name each plane, much as you do in solid works. Same reason - in a months time ‘Plane 3’ will mean nothing to you. I now name absolutely everything - every plane, sketch, extrusion, cut, etc etc. It takes very little time doing this as you go along and you get payback later on as it’s now very, very easy to isolate particular sequences in the timeline.

There's truth in that. Regarding resin, I'm finding ABS-like resin fairly tolerant of flexing, up to a point; and at that point, it simply snaps rather than remains bent. I keep meaning to read up on the structure of cured resin, I imagine it's crystalline, in case it's possible to heat treat it post-printing to make it more fibrous. I would have thought that, if the mast or spar has a carbon fibre/steel core, it would be fine. Something I'll test at some point.

Lovely detail there Daniel, even with resin printing (I assume) it looks like you are pushing the boundaries. I especially like the plank lines on the underside of the top. I have to admit I probably wouldn't have even thought of that. Are you not tempted to remake the masts as well? Doesn't look that hard 😁.

EG, this is a very helpful tutorial around basic workflow alone, I’m already beginning to feel slightly less daunted by the idea of taking on a hull (I.e a whole scratch built 3D printed mode). Richard, such a shame your couldn’t get permission for an AOTS book for the Cutty Sark. It’ll be the next thing I’ll build. I’m sure many here would appreciate a topic on building it in CAD.