Need Software Advice for Drawing Plans

[anaxamander49]

Can anyone recommend a good software package for drawing lines plans? 

 

My primary interest is in just drawing the sheer, body, and half breadth plans. Any 3D model I create would just be to ensure the hull is fair before I start making sawdust, so I don't need something that produces great artwork. My secondary interest is not spending too much. AutoCAD, for example, is a bit out of my reach.

 

As an FYI, I've tried Inkscape, which has the advantage of being free, but it isn't satisfactory. I'm now fiddling with Delftship. Is this the best I can do?

 

Thanks in advance for your advice!!!

[Gregory]

Fusion 360 is great for 2D and 3d..  Free for personal use..

[Bob Cleek]

Given your stated purposes, the easiest, fastest, and least costly method would be manual drafting. The fairness of a hull is easily determined with a batten. However, if you are enamored with CAD, that's another matter entirely. There are many forumites who are thoroughly versed in CAD options who can steer you in that direction.

Edited August 8, 2021 by Bob Cleek

[CDR_Ret]

Hi, anaxamander49.

 

I have attempted creating ship plans in Sketchup, Blender, Fusion 360, and DELFTship Free. All of these are open source, have free licenses for hobbyists, or are offered as a free version of the professional software.

 

Sketchup creates surfaces in polygons and there is no utility for creating useful hull plans that provides the information a ship model builder needs (e.g., stations, waterlines, and buttock lines). Also, if you attempt to scale down a full-sized digital model to model size, you risk losing precision in fine details due to the way Sketchup works (points, lines, and polygons simply disappear!).

 

Blender and Fusion 360 have (very) steep learning curves and, again, they don't really lend themselves to creating 2D building plans useful to ship modelers without a lot of fiddling around. While Blender is an amazing program, its developers are continually revising the features and interface, so a casual user never gets up to speed in the program.

 

DELFTship Free, in my opinion, is your best bet for creating useful working ship model plans. The program's 2D plan output shows the hull and expected details in standard profile, body, and plan/halfbreadth views. These views can also be customized to show specific objects and omit others, if desired. The program can export 2D DXF images in polyline format that can be imported into 2D vector graphics software for editing and formatting. In addition, the model surface is a true subsurface object that can be precisely shaped with a customizable control net to match existing 2D plans, if required. Like you, I used the program to reconcile incompatibilities among the three views of an existing set of hull drawings that I have come to believe was an unknown mixture of conjecture and actual measurements. The result was a fair hull that seems to reflect contemporary photos of the ship.

 

If you haven't already, I recommend reading through the many topics within this CAD and 3D Modelling/Drafting Plans with Software forum pertaining to the various 3D software others have attempted to use when creating ship plans, and then draw your own conclusions.

 

If you are having difficulties getting started with DELFTship (the manual isn't very good on work flow or process, just feature capabilities), please contact me or the other members who have used the program. Having a guide can help you past many of the frustrating aspects of this program.

 

Best regards.

 

Terry

[anaxamander49]

Thank you all for your input. It's been very helpful.

I've asked several questions on various MSW forums, and I'm always amazed at how helpful everyone is!

[Philemon1948]

Hello Anaxamander49,

 

I have some experience in this field. I faired an 18th century ship of 46 meter scale 1:10 and 1:1, old school, with battens on a mould loft. Right now I am doing the same thing only for a 17th century ship, around 44 meter, scale 1:10 the way they did that in those days, mainly without a mould loft. It is my experience that the best way to get a grip on the shape of the hull is doing it by hand and if necessary, enter the ordinates in a computer program so you can generate pictures and generate a model in the computer. But the computer chooses the way you look at the object, comparable to a lens on a camera. A wide angle lens gives a different perspective compared to a tele lens. So the best way to fair a ship is doing it by hand. I use Rhino as the program with which I can generate polylines and render the construction pieces which works very well for me. Rhino is good and not very expensive. I used AutoCad too but this program is not good with polylines and ludicrously expensive.

 

Good luck with you work.

[John Fox III]

Personally I use QCAD for plan drafting. It is limited to 2D drawing, but I can import .jpg/.jpeg files of scans of printed plans and trace them. They used to have a free version, not sure if they still do, but I only paid $40 US for the full version. It is similar in use to AutoCAD, but vastly cheaper. As with most CAD programs, it takes some getting used to, but if you've ever used a CAD program, or spent time with pencil/pen and paper to do drafting it's quit easy.

 

Anchor's A Weigh!

John Fox III

[Gregory]

Great suggestion John!  I have not heard of that before but it looks like a great 2D design/drawing program.  

It looks like a great resource for laser work. A robust tracing feature is at the heart of laser work.

 

QCAD

 

It is open source and free..

 

 

[Patrick Matthews]

Fusion360 is horrible for 2d drawings. Every drawing is based off 3d solid geometry... so you need to create solid things that produce body and sheer lines, a real pain.

[allanyed]

Fair price and pretty powerful program is TurboCad.   All the plans for the Euryalus books that Wayne Kempson produced were done with TC.  It can be used for 2D, 3D, and can produce STL drawings for 3D printers.  Drawings can be saved in many formats.

Allan