Hull plate development, Anyone used "Advanced Smart Unfold" ?

[TINKERTAILER]

Hello forum

Is there anyone here that is commercially using (or used) "Advanced Smart Unfold for Rhino3D / Inventor / Solidworks" from Solid3dtech for hull plate development ?

I have tried the smart unfold plugin for Solidworks on some simple hull transitions and it all seems suspiciously easy. The workshop normally cuts out the aluminium hull plates with some talented guess work but would like to speed up the process by getting as much of the vessel cnc cut as possible. If the process is successful it will certainly pay for its self quickly but if it is not quite perfect I will be on the receiving end of some first class swearing.

Are there any other packages of similar value ($1000USD) out there that are either integrated into Solidworks or with a relatively seamless transition that I should be looking at ?

[Fanie]

You can print it out on thin carboard to some scale, cut it out and fold it to get an idea if the unfold comes out right.

It's less work and cheaper than to find out the hard way.

Who knows, you may be so fascinated by the model that you kick the boat thing and do models only

I see you NZ chaps do swearing, The US guys cuss, only we in Sic Africa do both

[TINKERTAILER]

I have access to a CNC router and I did contemplate making a 50:1 plywood model of the vessel to check the hull plates. But then, an almost undetectable 0.1mm out on the model is still 5mm out in real life. And to our South African born / old sea-dog / fabricator who is not only rather adapt at swearing (and cussing I'm sure) but also suspicious of any technology that was't available to the team that built the Bismarck. That is too much.

[shellexpansion]

the easy way to ask for the reference from the company. Someone should have used it.