Rhino v. Surfaceworks/Solidworks

[JesperW]

Originally Posted by Sonadora

This functionality is built in to SolidWorks. This is part of the weldments capabilities.
...

It's simply a matter of sketching your spline path and selecting a profile.

Oh how I wish that would be true, it would have saved me sooo much work.
But unfortunatly it's not true. Weldments only work with lines and arcs, not with splines, making them useless for stiffeners.

I still use weldments for grabrails and stuff, though.

/j

[Raggi_Thor]

Originally Posted by JesperW

...But unfortunatly it's not true. Weldments only work with lines and arcs, not with splines, making them useless for stiffeners.
....

Rhino!
:-)

[JesperW]

Originally Posted by Raggi_Thor

Rhino!
:-)

Eh, well.... Rhino has no specific function for creating stiffeners either, so in this case it's no better.

[Raggi_Thor]

Sweep?
"Sketching your spline path and select a profile" said Sonadora.

I see now that the twist may be a problem...

[JesperW]

Originally Posted by Raggi_Thor

I see now that the twist may be a problem...

Yes. What I end up doing is defining two closely spaced "parallell" 3D splines on the hull plate face. Then sweep the stiffner profile with one as the path and one as a guide curve. That way the stiffener will twist to stay at 90 degree angle to the hull.

[kjk]

I am late to this thread but, I agree with sonadora. SW is a better and more powerful package because it is parametric. Working in a non parametric CAD environment is counter intuitive to me. Spreadsheet controlled models in SW are very easy to set up. That said, Rhino is great for freeform, surfaces and nurbs- its primary asset- but SW 's latest edition, 2007, has come along very well with its surfacing capabilities and it will just be a matter of time before it can accomplish what Rhino can in the surfacing dept. Rhino is of course cheap and SW expensive (but not like ProE or CATIA expensive) , which I believe, drives much of the loyalty towards Rhino.

[Michael Chudy]

Is there a way to demo solidworks? I see nothing on the site about it.
Mike

[Raggi_Thor]

I asked the local reseller about that.
They don't give away demo versions because they think you are not able to use it!
Try Alibre instead, www.alibre.com
(Yes, I am selling it :-)

[Raggi_Thor]

I agree with all of you :-)
Rhino is best for hull design because you can nudge the control point and get exactly the shape you want.
Parametric cad programs are great for interior structure.

[kjk]

Originally Posted by Michael Chudy

Is there a way to demo solidworks? I see nothing on the site about it.
Mike

I dont think SW has demos (that I've seen). I'd call the rep in your area.
One way to get it inexpensively is buy an educational version. Only 125.00. It comes with Cosmos and FLoworks... about another 20K worth of software. Whoever buys it needsto be enrolled in a college PT or FT. You must verify this with documents. It n only be insalled on one computer with limited re-installs.

SW tutorials, built in to the software, are excellent.

i think the biggest hurdle is understanding the parametric aspect.
You work with this totally different than you do with a program like ACAD or Rhino. It takes a little time but, afteryou've learned it, you wont go back

[signum]

I agreee with last opinion, Rhino is better in hull design, and this is what I use for, is great very intuitive, SW is better for interior assemblies where parts should fit. When I decided to see what CAD soft would do my work easier in boatbuilding design I started with AutoCad, good for mechanical design with regular shapes, then I tried SolidWorks and I was excited to see a 3D gray piece almost realistic turning around but to realise a hull shape seemed to be difficult, next has been CATIA which is wonderful soft but to complex for what I need, finnaly I reach to Rhino , with it I did my hull forms very easy,....and I rested here. I liked very much. I tried many other as TouchCad ( good for surface unfolding, but not so intuitive as Rhino) , MultiSurf, SolidThinking, but noone is like Rhino.

[Raggi_Thor]

I would like to add that I think parametric modelling is very tedious and time consuming in an early stage of a design spiral. All programs I have seen are based on a lot of 2D sketches with a lot of dimension, parameters and constraints. There is usually a lot of clicking involved to navigate through sketches, planes etc to change the parameters you want. If you have a very clear idea, you can start by creating most of the parameters and relations between them in a table or in Excel if you prefer, then you start modelling, but is that intuitive?

[Antisthenes]

now that v4 is out the validity of this question is no more


to add to what above said, it also constrains your design ability to break out of the box and do your own creative things with your OWN intelligence.

[SailDesign]

Say what you will, the best piece of software for any job, at the time it needs to be done, is the one you are most familiar with that will do it.

[Sean Herron]

Hello...

I agree with SD - whatever works with how you work that gets the job done is the way to go...

If there was one answer to all our problems - our wants - and our skill levels - then there would be no market economy and we would all become zombies or sheep and all the boats would look like soap bubbles...

Wait - this has already happened...

I am obviously not up to speed...

Software is a tool - and there a lot of 'twangle' tools out there - pliers that 'flip' into hammers and such...

Remember the early days of this crap - when most of the program geeks did not even know what a proper set of lines looked like - and their offsets had an incredible and useless accuracy of 4 decimals of an inch - gah...

SH.