Which cad program?

[treenail]

This may be old news to many but since I'm new maybe some one can help me.
I'm working on a S&G design (my first) and am looking for the easiest to use panel program. I have lofting, half model experience and have built several round hull (lapstrake) boats.
I would like to model the boat first but find it difficult to due (without cad) with this method. My computer experience is far from advanced.
Is the free Carlson Design program good, how about the 3D boat design program, are there others?
Thanks for your input.

[Lewisboats]

Freeship/delftship.

[frank pedersen]

3D Boat Design is apparently a pirated version of Freeship/delftship. I signed up for it, but I was able to get a refund. There are instructions on the WBF for using Freeship/delftship. Let us know how you make out.

Frank

[treenail]

Thanks guys for your input, I'll give it a look.

[benjaminshr]

Freeship/delftship.

This is a good choice for cad program ...

[aldebaran]

Is it possible to calculate the panels for stich and glue boats using the free version of delftship?

[Kudzu]

.....I'm working on a S&G design (my first) and am looking for the easiest to use panel program.
.........
Is the free Carlson Design program good, how about the 3D boat design program, are there others?

While I use FreeShip/DelftShip and love it, I do not recommend it for the first timer. I found it difficult to learn and gave up on it 2 or 3 times before I finally got it. The only reason I kept at it was I had a guy in Denmark that used it and he kept answering my questions by email. If you don't have someone to help you, your probably going to find it hard to use.

BUT, as i said, now that I know it, I love it! I use it all the time.

I found Hulls to be a very basic program, very easy to use. I think it does a good job within it's limits. I know a several people that still use it.


Is it possible to calculate the panels for stich and glue boats using the free version of delftship?

Yes... Well, not sure about Delftship. But go to Source Fourge web site and look for FreeShip version 2.6. That was the last public offering of FreeShip and it will. It's still free and legal. Just hard to find.

I printed out offsets for a S&G kayak and they turned out well. There were some minor issues that I think were not right, but that could have been because I was not that familiar with the program.

[huisjen]

I still use Ashalar Drawing Board, copyright '92, for Mac.

I also think highly of medium to heavy card stock and scotch tape, and could see how one might use some balsa and glue to help the project along.

Dan

[Lewisboats]

Yes on the Delftship panel question. Go to View/Plate developments.

Freeship can be had here...sometimes...when the server is working:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/freeship/files/

scroll down a bit for 2.6
or a version continued by someone else...extra stuff added.

http://freeship-plus.land.ru/indexEN.html

If you start out in hulls then you can import into freeship to tune it up a bit. You can use Carene 2008 and import it into freeship also.

http://pagesperso-orange.fr/robert.laine/ (down on the bottom)

There are a couple of additional steps but nothing to difficult. Using the offsets from the .txt file can be a pain but you can get (to me) better ones off the pictures in develop plates themselves. You can also nest all your stuff to obtain max economy.