CAD Model of a 29er Skiff Sailboat
Recently I undertook the task of modeling a 14-foot "29er" skiff sailboat in CAD.
The hull plans for a 29er are propriatary and unavailable from the manufacturer or online, so I had to figure out how to translate a physical boat hull into a computer modeling program.
This is the system I came up with..
Ingredients:
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Cardboard
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Bamboo Skewers (or dowels)
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Tape
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Large sheet of paper
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Straight edge
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Measuring tape
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Pen or pencil
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More tape
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Using tape I marked the centerline of the hull and perpendicular cross sections every foot. Using the cardboard rig (left) I sampled the crossections and transfered the sections to a pice of paper.
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After an afternoon of meticulous work, this was the result:
The two images above are the sampled outlines of a 29er hull sections taken at one foot intervals along the length of the hull.
The next step will be to line up the hull sections with centerline height measurements I've taken from pictures of the 29er hull on its side. After the sections are aligned in AutoCAD, I can skin the sections and the hull will be complete!