Steps when drawing lines plan

Thanks. No. I did that for the Westlawn course. I hadn't gotten to the construction drawings yet, and I never did do them. She's got a lot of top hammer. I actually had several jobs in my younger days as a draftsman. However, I was too slow and my line weights were bad, and other stuff, but it was passable. I knew some draftsman(persons, some were woman) that were so good their drawings could be considered art. However, I do enjoy working on a board. I used to have one at home in Fairfax, VA, but an RV is too small so now I use a computer and I am learning LibreCAD. I gave all my drawing instruments, splines, weights, etc to the Northwest School Of Boatbuilding in Port Hadlock, WA. I hope they're making good use of them.

 

Ok, who has used a ruling pen?
<raises hand>

 

I have used pencils, India ink, compasses to draw circles, rotring and, finally, CAD / CAM software. Fortunately since high school and in the first year of my career, I had technical drawing as a subject. That first year was so difficult that no more than 10% of the total applicants passed and we had only 5 subjects, one of which was technical drawing.

 

Sounds like a very tough school that one TANSL !

 

Of course it was. That is why I have some qualms about admitting that anyone, with a 10 minute course and a good command of a rendering program, says that he is a boat designer.

 

@TANSL I can understand that. I was a programmer for 20+ years and now managing a big dev team. There is a lot of people in the field that shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a computer and who, with the amount of crap they produce, ensure good programmers will have work for a lifetime.

But, I would still encourage anyone to learn to program. And I teached some VBA to a relative a while back so they could create themselves some excel macros for his company. He like it a lot and went on to create a whole suite of little tools for himself that he still uses to this day.

I wonder what the equivalent of those VBA macros would be in the boat design world? Surely designing and building oneself a small sailboat, such as what I am currently building, can be accessible to anyone willing to put in the effort to learn? I wouldn't even think of trying my hand at a proper yacht but I would assume that it would be possible for oneself to learn to design small open sailboats and go on to build them afterward?

 

@droussel , what exactly do you not understand from what I have said? I will gladly try to explain it to you. And what does what I said have to do with programming in VBA?

 

Oh lord! When I was 16 my parents gave me my first set of drafting instruments. I still have them, including ruling pens. I hated them. I always made a mess. When Kohinor (and others) came out with refillable pens in various line thickness, I immediately bought a set. Don't remember what they cost but they were expensive, and my inking work immediately improved.

As for the discussion about computer use, I would agree. Too many think that they can design anything (let alone boats) with a computer and a CAD program. They are delusional. I welcomed the first use of computers to design boats (and still do) but it's become something of a blight. I can remember when John Letcher developed the first program using b-splines to draw lines. It first ran on a TRS 80 (a TRASH 80) Radio Shack computer, but worked. But you had to know what you were doing to use it. Now, anyone can download a free CAD program that uses splines, and does it in 3D.

By the way, I answered my own question (do they still teach technical drawing in High Schools), Yes, in some, but as an intro to using CAD programs, so that students know the basics before they started using CAD to do design work.

 

@TANSL I said I did understand what you were saying when you wrote "That is why I have some qualms about admitting that anyone, with a 10 minute course and a good command of a rendering program, says that he is a boat designer". I was then simply making a parallel with my own experiences in my field of work.

 

@droussel, well, as a good professional that you are, who has reached your current status with work and effort, you will have problems admitting labor intrusion, people who want to get to where you are professionally speaking through shortcuts. That's what I mean.
Cheers.

 

@TANSL Yup, I think we are on the same page here indeed. Have a nice weekend!

 

I guess it isn't all that different to designing shoes, you can draw a boat or a shoe to any shape you like, but if it isn't fit for purpose, it doesn't matter how accurate the drawing is. It is probably best to know the basic physics involved before getting down to drawing or using a CAD program, either for the shoe or the boat, the physiology of feet hasn't changed, nor has the physics that affects boats, and you have to work with full due given to what is constrained by the immutable.

 

Yeah, same as me. I started in High school in the early 1970's with velum and lead, moved to ink on linen later in high school/ ollege, then to "rapidograph" pens (Koh-i-noor or Staedtler-Mars) and finally to ink or later plastic on mylar (with 7H lead layout lines as steel nibs cut the mylar). Still haven't found a computer drafting program I like for doing lines...still faster to do by hand.

I think everybody now know my position on CAD used by people (both a chain saw and an axe will fell a tree...neither determines which way it will fall) and companies (CAD reduces the floorplan footprint of an engineer 66% but only decreases his productivity by 50%). BTW I think it is getting close reviving the every 10 year thread on CAD in design:
In 10 years?? https://www.boatdesign.net/threads/in-10-years.625/

 

Droussel,
Some have made a wooden half mold first.
I like using the old necktop computer and the printer at the end of my upper extremities for now. I do my Tables of Offsets and the calculation for ratios in Excel. I may look like an fool but I’am not a idiot.
Good luck with your project.
I have a couple thousand hours in studying boats and know less than when I started.

Just a rough draft don't get your panties in a wad.

 

Think like a CAD program, use transparent paper and lay one page on top of the other. Match up WL, Butt or Diag then slide it to the station or places you want to compare points of interests.
If it gets to be a mess start over and use what you learned from the last drawing.