Importing tables of offsets from Excel to Freeship

[Troutcatcher]

Experimenting with Freeship I would like to import tables of offsets from Excel. Each column contains the x, y or z coordinates of a previously designed boat/half model. Is there any easy way of doing this??

[CGN]

"Yes" if you look in the manual there is an explanation on how to import chined hull or hull surfaces on freeship, for round hulls it may not be the best solution but should be close. also there is a tutorial on freeship on how to do such step by step.

[LP]

I haven't checked recently for improved methods, but I've done it and I wouldn't call it difficult, but it can be tedious.

I created a set of conversion cells to enter feet, inches and 1/8's that would return a decimal value. I was inputing offsets from an old set of plans. Or do it mentally. Anyway, I put the decimal conversion back into a standard offset table form. From that table, I had to take the values and put them in the format that Freeship understands. Essentially, starting at the sheer (or the keel) and progress consecutively through all offset points from top to bottom (or bottom to top) at each station. You can create can create stem, keel and transom profiles once you grasp the formating concepts.

I'm attaching an excel file. It doesn't have the conversion cells. I think I input the offset dimensions in as inches and converted them to feet in the table with the thin outline at the bottom of the spread sheet. I haven't looked at this spread sheet in forever so I'll make no guarantees about it. I think I was able to do a copy of the outlined area and paste it into notebook to get the .txt file that is also attached. The .txt file is what Freeship imports.

Easy? Probably not. Doable? Yes.


(I believe I'm safe in presenting these offsets as they were taken from a book I own. If anyone knows otherwise, you can PM me and I'll consider removing them. I believe this information is public domain now.)