Free plans

I always had to make money for different reasons inherent to life. I suppose it is the same for a lot of people.
I always sold my plans, some time at lost, some time at a good price, it depend of the situation.
All this to ask to you all: How can designers afford to give free plans, and what is the purpose of giving these plans.
I don't get it. It take at least 250 hours to do a good set, going to the 2000 hours for some specific project and 40 hours for just starting the lines and having a evaluation of the weight.
So all these hours for free? I can't believe that. Someone has to explain me the marketing system behind the free plan.
Thank you.
Meanwhile, I will continue to sell plans

 

Daniel
Good. And just tell people the plans are worth exactly what they cost. The free ones are worth nothing!

Any chance you could post some updates on building the houseboat?

Brian

 

Older plans are out there from designers who are retired or dead. They were paid long ago. Won't win races against today's highly engineered carbon fiber wonders, and not adapted for current materials. For a two sheet skiff though, workable.

 

Disagree; we developed 3 designs years ago and made them available for free. And this is how it looks at the end:
http://albatrossdesign.livejournal.com/4683.html
http://albatrossdesign.livejournal.com/1491.html

 

I also disagree, though I personally don't offer free plans, I do have several very low cost sets. I know of several very fine, free plans. Of course these aren't for 30' cruisers, but if you want a sound canoe, skiff, kayak or row boat, then there are plenty of goods ones. This said these are overwhelmingly shadowed by the real crap, also offered as free. I see the advantage of free plans as a starter boat. Once the bug is ingested, you'll be back for a new boat, probably paying the same designer for a stock plan. It's a good way to indoctrinate the novice builder with your plans packages and building techniques.

 

Alik
Ok, it was a flippant one-liner.
No problem with designers who are happy to provide some work for free, indeed its a nice gesture.

But the flipside is people expecting a good design to be free, or pirating one. In those cases my sympathies lie with the designers.

 

I would say that low-cost designs are worse than free designs. Some low-cost designs include 3 drawings A1 and table of offsets in imperial units from another smaller boat, where one has to multiply by, say, 1.152 to get required numbers! One needs a lot of imagination as addition to 200$ paid for such design...

Free designs are such because designer wants their designs built!

 

why don't you post some of your plans here so we know what you are talking about? ;-)

There are many amateur designers that post their own designs, some decent, some not. And as Par pointed out, it might just be part of their marketing strategy, get as many plans of your out there, with your name on it, as possible to hopefully get commissions later. Nothing really lost if the plan was already paid for by a previous client (and they agree to allow you to give it away).

 

You can find them on this website.

We are not amateur designers.

 

Also consider that we do not sell plans to amateur builders (at least to those who never built boats before). So they can use our free plans; but responsibility and support is limited.

 

Alik

I think Petros was "talking" to the OP

Richard Woods

 

different reasons to offer free plans

I did with a lot of my stuff. Actually, this strategy did bring me some returns. When serious clients see ingenuity, quality and thoughtfullness -- they bite. Of course in my mind it is very important to distinguish trash from a sound offer.

One more thing, very often those "free' plans work out only as a bait to lure a potential person to the internet site.

 

hey Albatross, where are those free plans?

I couldn't find them on your website.

 

I never said those are on my website! It is purely commercial and has nothing to do with amateur boat construction.

Check THIS website.
http://directory.boatdesign.net/detail/4686.htm
http://directory.boatdesign.net/detail/3892.htm