Best drafting software

[brissyben]

Hi all,
Just wondering what everyone uses as there drafting software? I us autocad (2d) and find it good but I get over drawing each view to represent a 3d model i.e. If you draw a part and then review it and find you need to make a small edit, you then need to go through and edit all of the views/drawings that show this part.

What 3d software does every one use that is suitable for the drafting tasks performed by a Naval Architect? i.e. Inventor, Soldiworks/Catia, Ship Constructor and if you had the money to by any one of these programs which would it be?

[Roger_Wegener]

I use Moi - because I think it is the best 3D design software on the planet - and I have tried them all ;-) It is quick, easy to learn and most of all it just works and keeps working all day - never had it crash yet. Check it out - it will surprise you. http://moi3d.com/

[Raggi_Thor]

Rhino is also quite popular. Same file format as Moi?

[pavel915]

I strongly recommend Rhino.
If you buy rhino, then you will be able to get help from a lot of people in this forum who use rhino. Most of the naval architect uses it for the works you are looking for.

[b1ck0]

I can recommed Rhino, too. If you are student the license is only 200 EUR. You can simply creat any shape you want very quick. The menus the logicly arranged so it's really simply and quick to learn the software. You can also buy video tutorials for Rhino from Lynda.com, the link. Good luck

[Kiwifinn]

Rhino is the way to in my opinion. Rhino seems to have become the standard tool many boat designers. I've been using it for five years now, I even do all my 2D drafting on it, which is thankfully a very small part of my workload It's easy to learn and there does not seem to be much you can not do with it. I also run Rhino Marine for boat related calculations, weight studies etc. I have a Wacom tablet and a 3D Connection spaceball thingy, this combination really speeds things up and keeps the old RSI well under control, no more pain in the wrist and arm.

[pavel915]

Originally Posted by b1ck0

I can recommed Rhino, too. If you are student the license is only 200 EUR. You can simply creat any shape you want very quick. The menus the logicly arranged so it's really simply and quick to learn the software. You can also buy video tutorials for Rhino from Lynda.com, the link. Good luck

Why video tutorials should be bought at first? As he knows autocad, learning the basic of rhino just need reading the manual. And when he wants to go for drafting which is related to boat design then he can also get many free tutorials also. And a lot of helpful people are here in this forum to help him. So I will suggest him to buy rhino only.

[brissyben]

We also use Rhino, but mostly for 3d GA's or trying to pitch an idea to the buliders. I find the quality of 2d drawings produced in rhino (make2d) are poor. i.e if we have a 3d model then using make 2d and take it autocad, the lines are abit of mess. Any one had experience using CATIA or Inventor for boat design?

[Ad Hoc]

Most 3D softwares are really 2D but in a 3D enviornment.

What you are describing, changing one part and everything is auto updated, is really high end stuff and not cheap. Does the job very well, but not cheap. The latest Inventor (2011) is very good and ProE does this too. NX is probably the best, but you only get what you pay for...since NX is more expensive than ProE, and ProE is more expensive than Rhino and so on...

I would suggest you contact 'alidesigner',
http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/pro...idesigner.html
he can give you a much better summary than i can.

[Kiwifinn]

The boatbuilding company I used to work for bought a copy of Inventor about 4 years ago since a large project they were building was drawn up in in Inventor. I found it very difficult to get my head around, possibly partly because the huge files we received were badly organised and not very accurately drawn. The model has to be very well set up to get all the different parts to link together properly. Definately need to go on a cource to pick up how to drive the software. Also, the computer hardware we had was not up to the task at all so lots of waiting and crashing. Inventor did not seem to be much use for creating surfaces, more set up for mechanical design. Very good for detailing interiors etc once one has learned how to use the software and purchased powerfull hardware.

[brissyben]

Thanks for the info, how does shipconstructor compare? Can shipconstructor be used for general drafting or is tailored towards creating ship structures I.e frames longitudinals stiffeners

[Raggi_Thor]

If you already have AutoCAD you can use ShipConstructor for detailing all the parts and nesting them on sheets for cnc cutting. You have automatic numbering of parts and easy navigation from frame to frame etc, and semi-automatic nesting (because full automatic is never as good as you are).

You can't design a hull in ShipConstructor, so you need Rhino for that, and for general 3D modeling (where AutoCAD still is 10 years behind).

[ACuttle]

I've done boats in a few of these so for what its worth, this is my 20p's worth;

Rhino is good for producing hull forms and developing plating. For structural work it's a bit poorer. There's no true 3D structural design elements so you'd pretty much just be doing 2D drafting in a 3d enviroment. There are plugins that give you some naval-architecture tools but I've always had other software to use instead.

Previously I've worked a lot with Rhino for surfacing and Solidworks for producing structural models. Then working back and forth between them for a finished product - but you're looking at about £10k worth of software there.

Inventor and Solidworks are pretty much interchangable, they're both very strong for producing 3D parametric models, good for flat structure and folded sheet-metalwork. However neither are designed for marine applications and as a result with both you pay for a lot of functionality that you will never use. To handle decent sized vessels 20m+ you'd need decent machine to run it. SW (and likely Inventor) doesn't like creating working geometry/models for complex curved forms - like most hulls.

A program I've looked at in other industries is Alibre, which works very similarly to SW and comes in at a much more reasonable price, for an smallscale/non-comercial user this linked with Rhino may make a very effective package, for about £3-4k.

Shipconstructor is good too but has a very hefty price-tag. It's designed for straight-up marine work but you'll still need to be getting your hullform from somewhere (Rhino, maxsurf etc.) - to make SC worthwhile you'd have to be designing a lot of boats and be doing craft of a decent size.

I couldn't easily say which I prefer, SW and SC are both great in their own way (and less helpful in others) and I've never found anything better than Rhino for doing the early work. At the end of the day I've always used Rhino in conjuction withsomething else with 80% of my time spent using the something else.

If someone ever created Solid-Shipconstructor I'd be a happy man.

[Joe Petrich]

I am a big fan of Rhino. Along with Orca it is great for hull and superstructure design. We don't use it for 2D work though. For that we use AutoCAD. But, as others have said before, if you want your 2D drawings to automatically update when you change your 3D model you will need to use one of the solid modeling packages like Solidworks, Inventor, etc. That can get expensive.

[raw]

A lot of people here are confusing a modeling software like rhino for a drafting tool like autocad. Rhino is a reasonably good modeling tool but a very poor drafting tool. Autocad will allow users to create high quality detailed drawings (drafting) to convey information to builders which is kinda the entire point.

A a freelance consultant, one thing to consider is communication with your clients. Using a less common software can put you into the "orphan" category which makes things difficult to communicate electronically without loss of data. I am finding more and more builders want electronic drawings (not simply pdfs) for their own in house production usuage. Autocad (at least 2D) is the only software that fills this void 99% of the time.

FYI, I use rhino, Acad maxsurf etc. and understand the original posters concerns. Perhaps you need to consider your layering a little more to make changes easier.