prolines help

I have prolines V7 but cannot draw a tri. I manage to draw the centre hull and floats but cannot mange to include the cross beams.Anyone know how?

 

it may be a way it may work, it may don't, if you are running the pro version you can create separate files for the hulls (that are part of the trimaran) and the beams and then save each file as a nurb surface (iges) and then impot them all into the main hull file. that may do the trick. but...it may not work at all, or be usefull, i use prolines v7 basic and i'm not able to do such trick but its a matter to try.

 

hi guest, I have the prolines v7 pro version and I have tried what you suggested - but I still cannot make it work! I have managed though to save the hulls in dxf files and I can import either to make a tri but I still cannot save as one complete design, even without the beams i.e cannot save three hulls together. I have not managed to include the beams at all into this design and have tried all files dxf nurbs etc etc. Basically does anyone who uses prolines v7 pro know if it is possible. I have asked the suppilier of the program but have been told to modify the 'example files' supplied with the program - still no luck though! Do I require another type of software program to do this?

 

there are some in the market capable to do that one is Prosurf which i use, other software may be Maxsurf.

Prosurf handles many surfaces the pro version do that, and have some extra capabilities like Trim surfaces and thicken the surfaces you also have al preliminary stability data, its not as fancy as prolines but it does the trick.

there is another software that works very good its touchcad3d, unfolds plate and has all bell and whistles to trim and join and all CAD commands which in this cas thats wath you are looking for, does basic stability, and like i said unfold any surface, i don't have an idea how it will behave trying to calculate a trimaran but again a demo and a quick email to the guy that wrote the software will help, personally i like touchcad.

you can download a fully finctional demo of proSurf that saves 25.
and touchcad demo too it wont save.

i personally i will create the beams with the shape that i want, (i use rhino) then i export this beams to prosurf and finish the whole trimaran.

prosurf accepts input of iges files.

and for the end prosurf and touchcad may be your solution.

sorry that the trick didn't work out, and i hope this comments help you acomplish what you are trying to do.

 

I believe Vacanti's Prolines, basic or professional, only allows hulls to be comprised of 1 NURBS surface, along with ability to generate a deck. Check your manual to verify this. I bet you'll never get it to accurately calculate righting moment at varying heel angles for a multihull. I used prolines Basic for several years, thru version 6.30, but have not loaded it since I bought a new PC.

Newave System's ProSurf allows an unlimited number of surfaces in creating a hull, so you could model several hulls in one file. Newest version also has great relational and trimmed surfaces features. I use ProBasic, but have not yet updated to the latest version. Hulls in ProBasic are limited to 5 or 7 surfaces (can't remember which, offhand). The same caveat regarding calculating righting moments for the combined hull system holds here as well.

If you have Prolines, or ProSurf, for that matter, look at exporting IGES surfaces into another 3D CAD program or surface modeler such as Cadkey, Rhino, or FormZ to finish detailing the boat.

 

sofware for multihulls??? are there any??

Thanks guest and Chris Krumm for your helpful replies. It seems that another program is the answer., well maybe prolines files exported to another program like rhino or cadkey would do the trick!? I'll try and download a demo and see what I can work with. Next question is - does anyone use rhino or cadkey? - what advise can you give me - I'm only just learning how to use these programs and need direction, especially for multihulls.

 

I use Cadkey for solid and surface modeling and detail drafting. It is fairly expensive to get into the current version - on order of $2500 or so. I use it because I do a lot of dimensioned drawings for mechanical assemblies based on ACIS solid models, and boat design is a hobby. It has much more extensive dimensioning, tolerancing, and annotation tools than most conceptual surface modelers. But sounds like you might not need that anyway.

Have tried the Rhino demo and its a pretty slick program. I'm sure many others here would say buy it and add some of the hydrodynamics plug-ins and it's all you'll need. You'd probably have an investment on order of $900-$1000.

Try the demo for Newwave Systems latest version of ProSurf. At $795, it lets you do unlimited surfaces; relational points, curves, and surfaces; plate development; hydrostatics; curve and surface fairing; many import and export formats. I'm sure you could build any mono or multihull in that program. I won't buy it because I can generate the hulls in their ProBasic version and import them into Cadkey for all the additional fleshing out (from adding bulkheads on down to designing a rudder head assembly.)

 

For info in rhino look at the other posted messages here at the forum there is alot of comments already here about rhino.