Designing a wooden boat in Solidworks 1

[Loola]

Hi all, my desire is to design a wooden boat in clinker built style (the boat hull is made up of overlapping planks), it can even be called lapstrake, and have that done with Solidworks. My question about this is this: When I have bent end shaped all the planks to fit the hull, I would like to have them laid out (flattened) so I in the end can have them cut in a CNC machine. How do I do to lay them out?

I build the planks by the loft tool, and bend them with a guide curve. I am using SW 2008.


Thanks in advance,

Loola
Sweden

 

[JMirisola]

You might try creating the planks with sheet metal features...

Jeff Mirisola, CSWP, Certified DriveWorks AE

http://designsmarter.typepad.com/jeffs_blog

 

[drawoh]

Loola,

That sounds like a challenge.

What sort of bending do you do to the wooden planks you will build your hull out of? If the bending is three dimensional, I don't know if the sheet metal features will help you.

I was under the impression that clinker hull planks were cut straight, and then steamed and bent to shape. This would be stronger than cutting wooden planks across the grain.

I have straightened out 3D[ ]lofted objects by creating a bent version and a straight version. I set the length of the straight version so that it is the same weight as the bent one. This works nicely for me for cable routing. It lacks the intelligence you would want for specifying hull planks.

JHG

 

[m1mason]

I know that CATIA V5 has a tool that would flatten Unruled surfaces. SWX does not come a similar function.

Is this what you're looking for?

http://mtm-cadtutorials.blogspot.com/2008/09/catia-v5-unfold-complex-unruled.html

http://mtm-cadtutorials.blogspot.com/

 

[smcadman]

I would use the sheet metal feature and tweak the K-factor to get the correct flat pattern.

On a side note, maybe the OP can help you since it sounds like a similar project:

http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=224648&page=0

Flores

 

[Updraft]

Flores,

The tweak is very simple. For very large bend radii compared to the material thickness you can use a k-factor of .5, which puts the neutral axis exactly in the middle of the thickness. This is also supported by the bends being elastic instead of plastic deformation.

I think the problem will be if the plank shapes have lofted bends instead of straight bends. SWX can flatten straight, but not lofted bends.

- - -Updraft

 

[Loola]

Hi,

Thanks for the advice about the sheet metal tool. At first let me say that I am a newbe to SW, but I see this boat project as a chance to improve my knowledge about CAD design.
If I use the sheet metal tool to “build” the planks, how can I have the ability to bend the planks to fit the hull? The bend would not have an even radius, more like the shape of a part from an ellipse. Is it possible to use a guide curve like in the loft tool? Or how can I get an uneven radius when using the sheet metal tool?


Loola

 

[ShaggyPE]

If I understand your shape correctly, the lofted bend would be the tool you would want to use. The concern however, is that the flat pattern generated by the lofted bend may not be accurate. If you have an understanding of what the flat shape should be for a few of your locations, you could use that as a check.

-Dustin
Professional Engineer
Certified SolidWorks Professional
Certified COSMOSWorks Designer Specialist
Certified SolidWorks Advanced Sheet Metal Specialist

 

[drawoh]

Loola,

I do not think the sheet metal tool is going to work for you. Each of your planks will be a lofted shape with a complex, curved path, and a rotated section. You will have to control your section so that at each point along the loft, you will have the same length, width, and perpendularity.

It sounds like you are taking straight pieces of wood planking, and warping them to fit onto a frame of some sort.

What intelligence do you want out of this thing?

Presumably, you want to itemize your lumber pieces, which SolidWorks will do easily.

You want to know how many feet (meters?) of lumber is required. This is more complicated. If you set the density of your boards, you can extract the total weight (mass?) from SolidWorks, and use your desktop calculator to figure out the total length. You can also do this for each individual plank, to work out a cut list.

It looks to me like you could work out the board lengths automatically, if you are willing to do API programming.

JHG

 

[Loola]

Hi,

I am very glad to see that there are replies to this subject. I think that it would be appropriate with some further explanations to it.

I have added a picture:
It shows how the clinker built style looks in general. A rough sketch of how a hull plank could look like (the profile slightly changes for each plank that are added to the hull, no one looks the same). And a picture of a real boat made in clinker built style.

I will try to explain some key features that SW needs to hold to be at any help in this project.

Lets assume that the hull would be built with 5 X 3/4 inch planks. This plank would bend very easy in one direction, and very little in the other. Is there a way to make SW “understand” this differentials in the bending ability of the “material”. The plank even has to be twisted at different angles along its lengths. Is there any way to control this bending and twisting?

I have done some tests with the loft tool, but the drawback is, as I see it, that there is no way to flatten the planks after they been bent end shaped. This is necessarily, thou I in the end would like to cut this planks in an CNC machine and actually build me a boat…… of course, I would start with a model, lets say at a scale of 1:10.

Could it be that SW not holds the right tools for this project????

Any comments are much appreciated.


Loola
Sweden

 

[ctopher]

I don't know if this will help, but search in YouTube. There may be some videos that show some boat design.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS31uJczzvo

Chris
SolidWorks/PDMWorks 08 3.1
AutoCAD 08
ctopher's home (updated Aug 5, 2008)
ctopher's blog
SolidWorks Legion

 

[ctopher]

I forgot about the flex feature:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlwaua5n-zw

Chris
SolidWorks/PDMWorks 08 3.1
AutoCAD 08
ctopher's home (updated Aug 5, 2008)
ctopher's blog
SolidWorks Legion

 

[jeff4136]

I'm neither a SW user nor a boat builder but will
offer some thoughts and, ideally, learn something
in the bargain. It's my belief that ...

1) SW can create flat patterns from any(?)
developable / flat wrap / zero Gaussian
Curvature 'plate'. If that is incorrect
correction and clarification would be
appreciated.

2) The biggest problem (other than taking quite
a lot of tedious work?) will be developing
the descriptive geometry and techniques to
model the developable plates / planks with
the desired contours.

The attached is much (effectively 2 planks) simpler,
but I believe the principles will be very similar.

Attachment (~280 KB):
.Assembly STEP, unit: meter, (1) part is hull
surfaces to be thickened.
.JPG image.


-Jeff Howard (wf2)
Sure it's true. I saw it on the internet.

 

[rfus]

These guys are worth mentioning in the realm of SolidWorks and boat design:

http://www.aerohydro.com/

They have a Flattener that may provide you the tools you need:

http://www.aerohydro.com/products/marine/msplex.htm

rfus

 

[JohnPi]

Check out GeometryWorks 3D. They offer a SolidWorks add-in called GW3DFeatures that can map a surface to a plane.

I tested it with your model and it seemed to work OK.

One of my customers that makes large (150ft) shoreline cruise boats uses it to develop the hull plates for their boats. Works quite well.