AutoCad, Inventor, CADKey

[Fibertron]

I have autocad, inventor and cadkey availble to me at school, i would like to design a 17 foot tunnel boat or a 14foot vpad boat. is it possible to use these programs to design a boat, and make 3d renderings.... i can use cadkey to make basic 3d shapes but i have never used the other 2...any tips or advice is appreciated...

[Andrew Mason]

I recommend you download the free copy of Maxsurf Academic from http://msacademic.formsys.com to do the hull design and use one of the other programs mentioned to do final detailing.

[CGN]

You can use cadkey if you have the version for surfaces, if you don't then download maxsurf academic and design your hull surfaces there, and then you can use inventor to do the structure and interiors, if you use inventor to the max, then you don't need cadkey or autocad (maybe autocad to do sketches of your boat).

Now if you want to cut patterns for the boat, then a sofwtare like rhino or prosurf can help, but maybe stick to the ones you have plus maxsurf, build the frames of the boat and then loft the surfaces from the boat, way more fun.

good luck

[Chris Krumm]

Use hull design software that can do all you r fairing and hydrostatics and export surfaces in IGES format. I know Nautilus' ProChine, ProSurf and ProBasic all do that. Other probably do as well. Then finish surface and solid modeling the boat in Cadkey/Keycreator (version 20 or later) - surfaces and solids are very robust, sophisticated, but not parametric (but you don't need that). Cadkey also works well for doing dimensioned layouts and detailing.

Chris Krumm

[Raggi_Thor]

You can do it all in Inventor, draw a few frames and use the lofting feature then the shell feature to amke the hull. Interior and bulkheads may be created as "ribs".
But I agree it's easier to start a new design in programs designed for the job. I like the relatively new Naval Designer, www.navaldesigner.com