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Boat Hull modeling?


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Modeling Hulls is a peculiar problem. The easiest approach is to use Lofting of the Cross & Longitudinal sections keeping the vertex count consistent. Adding & Subtracting Solids completes the shape. However, describing the exact hull polyline curvatures may require the use of a dedicated 2d Plot app or Excel then exporting the xyz data for parametric curves.

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You can also create the boat sections using a NURBS curve, then use the Create Surface from Curves command to create a hull from the nurbs curves.

This is how exotic cars are also designed in VW.

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Solidworks has a tutorial on their web site that shows the basic concepts of boat hull design. Perhaps you can look at it and get an idea of how it works then translate it to vwks tools. Basically nurb curves and lofting are what you want to do. Although its a little tricky to manipulate them. Once you get the hang of it it goes pretty smoothly.

http://www.solidworks.com/pages/products/SolidWorks_2007/SolidWorksOfficePremium2007.html

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I have done this with a sailing dinghy.

Make an extrude of a bezier curve with no more control points than required - coarsely representing one half of the midsection of the hull. Convert it to a nurbs surface (it should become a single surface).

Work on the nurbs points of that surface individually to shape the hull. You can also work with the weight of the individual points - but do so only, when you have to - like in the stem of the boat - as it reduces the overall harmony of the surface. When you are satisfied with the result, mirror the surface to make the full hull and use the 'Create Contours' tool to produce the boat hull lines.

The first steps only applies to a sailing boat hull, but you can use the create countours command on any solid.

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Solidworks has a tutorial on their web site that shows the basic concepts of boat hull design. Perhaps you can look at it and get an idea of how it works then translate it to vwks tools. Basically nurb curves and lofting are what you want to do. Although its a little tricky to manipulate them. Once you get the hang of it it goes pretty smoothly.

http://www.solidworks.com/pages/products/SolidWorks_2007/SolidWorksOfficePremium2007.html

Neither VW or SolidWorks do a particularly good job in actual professional hull fairing. Not that it is anything wrong with these programs. It's just that marine design has special needs. Most professional designers therefore use dedicated programs, as they provide a much better shape control. Things like dynamic cross sectioning is an absolute must to see what you are doing. An example can be seen demonstrated at http://www.touchcad.com/tc3training.html

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Hi Ken

If you are looking to design and build a boat forget it. I would not even attempt to produce a boat hull with VW. Part of our family business is a boat yard and yacht design and we use the industry standard Maxsurf from Formsys "formsys.com". This is a package like VW were you can purchase various modules for hull design and analyses, however if you are just producing a 3d model for illustrative purposes struggle on, but like you I wish VW had some features for the marine/boat-building industry? What do you think Katie "I know your are watching"

Edited by Carl Newton
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I visited a school which uses VW in boat design. It's not impossible. The decision really depends on what is the expected outcome.

A relatively straight forward approach to modeling boats, cars, and the likes is to create nurbs curves representing cross sections. A surface can then be created from the nurbs curve network and you end up with a 3D model.

This is a pretty standard approach across the board for modeling complex products like boats and vehicles in a variety of CAD & 3D modeling software programs.

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I have just taken a look at the 2 suggested movies from http://www.designexpress.be/NL/IntB-8.html and http://www.solidworks.com/pages/successes/Success_Stories.html - click Demos. You will have to sign in to view the Demo movies but they are quite good.

It would be nice if VW could produce a couple training movies in English to show haw to produce a couple of quality hull designs i.e. a displacement hull, and a semi displacement hull with chimes fitted out with bulkheads, floors and fittings etc.

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