> Hi All,

> With snow predicted for today, it's getting too cold to build/paddle so
> it's to the "indoor stuff" now.

> I would like to capture some kayak plans on computer this winter. Any
> suggestions for a CAD program to use? Ideally the program would be
> something with a commonly used format.

> I have access to AutoCAD14. Is it suitable for drawings of kayaks?
> Comments? Suggestions? I imagine there is a "For Dummies" book
> available - any other suggested reading?

> Thanks

> Hank

At work I use a CAD program called CATIA (costs $25,000 per licence - so there, Craig! ;-) I used it to plot points for the Guillemot forms, then lofted surfaces off of them. Pretty neat -- I can spin the thing around in 3D and get a really good feel for the size and shape that way. (Went with an Outer Island instead, though.) I also plotted points for the panels of Chris Cunningam's plywood Greenland kayak that was published in the Fall '94 issue of Sea Kayaker magazine. But since this only gives flat panels, I couldn't model it up in 3D space the same way I did for the Guillemot. All it gave me was a drawing that I could use to cut panels with. I plotted these out in 1/8 scale and plan to make a model of it using some red oak veneer.

If all you want to do is plot forms, then any CAD package will do. One of the cheaper, more readily available ones will probably be AutoCAD LT (called AutoCAD Light, although it really stands for Linear Transformation.) It's primarily for 2-dimensional work. If you want to design your own boat or tweak an existing design, you'd probably be better off with a naval architecture program. They range in price from free (shareware) to expensive, depending on additional functions of the program. The naval architecture programs can help you design a boat with slab panels and can usually perform some basic analyses such as prismatic coefficient and block coefficient. I seem to remember a shareware program called Plyboats, but a quick Lycos search didn't yield any related results. Do some poking around and you may be able to find something similar.

And would this weather have been too cold for the Inuits or Aleuts to get out and paddle?

Dean