Best CAD for 2d plans?

[stonedpirate]

Hello,

I have made plans in Carene and imported them into delftship and both are quite good for designing and hdrostats.

But when it comes to print out the actual plans to cut out the plywood, what software is best for making accurate 2d plans?

Carene makes good 2d chines but there are no dimensions and it looks cluttered. If i export the chines as a dxf file, what program is good for importing them and creating the final plans?

Is autocad overkill?

Thanks :)

[stonedpirate]

Its all good.

Imported it into freeship and got:

http://img251.imageshack.us/img251/5920/der.gif

Too easy :)

Who said boat design was hard :P

Now i just need some naval architecture principles and i'm off :)

[alidesigner]

Progecad is almost identical to autocad but is only around $450. Doesnt handle large drawings as well though - I found it a lot slower than autocad. Has a free trial.

You can also try a free Alibre demo which used to default to Alibre xpress once the 30 days is up and I think the 2D side of it stayed on.

Or solid edge give away their 2D platform for free at www.solidedge.com.

[stonedpirate]

Thanks Ali.

I'll check them out if these programs get too limited.

Cheers

[liki]

Qcad could well be enough for you. The only little problem is that it does not support splines that pass through their control points, but the cost is only something like 30 USD.

TurboCAD is a much more sophisticated CAD (than Qcad) with the cost of the 2D version at under 200 USD, I think.