My first CAD designed ship-sorta!

[CMDRTED]

It's been awhile since I contributed something to the field besides "sage advise" and general supporting us troops. I always had a hankering to design model ships, and it was this drive that got me into the paper model world. When I was a kid in S. Phila. we didn't have a bunch of bucks to buy the big plastic things from Revell and Auroura so I turned to paper. My first ships were simply coloured silouettes, cut out and place on a cardboard stand. We used to "torpedo them" with those soft pellet z guns. In 6th grade a nun was teaching us solid geometry and had us cut out cones cubes cylinders etc, so I got it into my head these can be stacked and shrunk etc into things resembling turrets superstructure etc. I got an A that year! My first true 3d ships had little to no shear lines or gracefull hulls. The superstructures weren't bad just the hulls. None of those early ships survived. I built a few while on submarine patrols many years ago, then came schools and hobbies took a back burner. In the lst 5-6 years I rediscovered the hobby and was amazed that the world had "caught up with me"! In truth I hadn't a clue there was a world wide card model industry. A couple years back I designed an Evarts class DE from just the 2 view drawings and alot of hand designing and painting and trial and error. This beauty survives and is in 1/400 scale. To keep with my first commercial venture into card ships from JSC. Here's some pics with my first commercial ship model the JSC Hood also in 1/400...

[CMDRTED]

My next forray came after reading Hornblower and Aubry/Maturin. I had to desing a sailing ship model to visualize some of the action; "coming about", "man the braces" etc. I bought up some wood ship model planes and books about technique and used paper instead of wood strips. Ibought some "spiling curves, french curves, etc and built up a little cutter from the US Revolution the Lee. I started on a similar sloop and the Nina, but they are on perpetual back burner for now. Here are some pics of the sloops hull showing the frameing technique and the finished Lee. Both were done by hand and hand instruments, they are almost all paper except the blocks and rigging, and a couple wire rings for rigging etc..

[CMDRTED]

Now that the longest intro is done, I'm kinda amazed to present the first steps into a sort of CAD designed model, I'll keep the name etc. Until I commit to which ship in the class. I used Paintshop pro, a scanned 2 view image, and a heck-ov-a lot of trial and error. I have Rhino but am overwhelmed every time I try to fire the damn thing up. For colouring and quick edit, cloneing I use a very old photo edit program. I have copied the thing onto a disc and load it into every computer since the first.
Here are some prelim pics, the first showing the 2nd gen hull with deck pieces and the aft hull sides. No it won't be green, and yes it is only a waterline kit. I kinda like modeling waves etc from acrylic gel. The 2nd pic has a 3rd gen deck top with just a llittle red added to the wooden deck. The 3rd is the rounded bottom/buttocks section aft. I had to use an orange peel design to get it gently rounded curved at the waterline. The 4 th pic is a close up of the gen 2 aft deck with some 'xperimental' mushroom vents. I use a technique I nicknamed "forced perspective" for a lot of the deck and other details. The pieces are flat but from just the right amount of shadeing some of these pieces look 3d enough, see pic 5. The scale is 1/400, but there is enough detail (Darwin) to enlarge to 1/250. I'm just not up to building that big... Yet!

[CMDRTED]

Pic 5 just wouldn't upload so I saved it for this series. The other pics are the prelim fwd superstructure and fwd deck top with a gun tub for S&Gs. I'll try the next gen formers and fwd hull tomorrow, I forgot to add a little fwd deck shear. Kudos to the correct class ID. Hints, not a ship of the line when designed, slower than the Cutty Sark, fought in WW2. She had an interesting mix of engines and a lot of various armaments...

[NOBI]

I admire your talent, both build and design skill...Great job on that ships

[Barry]

Looking very good Ted

[kooklik]

Wonderful works , can't belive that made of Paper !!
Thanks for sharing Ted.
BR.
----kooklik----

[Golden Bear]

Wow, Ted, you've been busy. Thanks for sharing pictures of everything. I love your work!


Carl

[Don Boose]

That early DE was beautiful, Ted. And so are the other ships. Truly impressive work!

I'm enjoying this fascinating thread. My mind is still too numb from the final push to finish my book (sent off to the editor yesterday) to make a guess on the ship, but I'll try later when the fog clears.


Don

[lee4752]

Great waves. Maybe you could post a thread to show us how you do it.

[Don Boose]

The hull shape looks rather like a Treasury-class cutter (not a ship of the line when originally built and had a variety of armaments). But slightly faster than the Cutty Sark (20 knots vs. 17.5 knots) and, as far as I know, all the versions of the Treasury had geared turbines.

Don

[maurice]

That'd 'av' to be my assessment too (based mainly on the location of the focsle break and superstructure shapes and locations).
Remember being mighty impressed with your Evarts and Lee in a previous incarnation Ted. Did you have any formal exposure to geometry or tech drawing after grade school, just curios why Rhino is so daunting ?

[CMDRTED]

Maurice, not one bit! I really sucked at math thru school. In college I got A's in algebra but that was because I had 2 excellant profs that explained things in a "see spot run" way. I still retain the small algebraic things in my head for my job. I'm an ER Physician, very little math required, except ; Patient A weighs 150 kilos and did 2 lines of crack and was shot 3 times, how long before his gang rivals arrive to finish the job! I've hacked thru every free 3d program including the BT CAd that the one Russian site had. Just can't get the Knack of it. I thought when (if) I retire I'd take a computer graphics course just to design and build models. You should see how I design in 2D, I have a 19" flat screen that I take measurements with a ruler and pieces of solder for the curves, then flatten them out. It is a slow learning process. Thanks all for the encouragement, hope to finish up the hull soon.

[Barry]

Ted

You need very few of Rhino's commands to model a hull

Curves Polylines (extend all curves beyond the stopping point on the plan)
Extend curve (just in case you forgot the above comment)
Move (move to line up the frames, all are drawn at the centre axis point) or select and drag
Rotate (rotate 180 degrees because plans have a front and back half frame drawing)
Extrude surface (for cutting planes)
Trim
Edit- layers - copy to new layer (otherwise you seem to loose your carefully drawn points)
Lock layer
Change layers
Loft to let Rhino draw the surfaces

The side bar help animations are great don't read the words though, they are frightening.

The following sites give you a lot of help very simply for the most part


http://www.kipperboxes.co.uk/assets/Su7_Tutorial_text.html(how (http://www.kipperboxes.co.uk/assets/Su7_Tutorial_text.html%28how) to set up the background images)
http://www.3drender.com/rhino/boathtml/6.htm (look at the trick on the bow bulge also works on carrier bow overhangs)
http://www.rhinocentre.nl/pdf_bestanden/Rapid%20Hull%20Modeling%20in%20Rhinoceros.pdf

barry maths challenged in all aspects

ps I know nothing about Rhino apologies for the hijack

[Golden Bear]

Maybe I need to send an email to Ted with some "get started" screenies! Rhino has been an easy learn for me but I am decent at math, great at 3D geometry (really my only true talent in life...) and have tons of experience in 3D CAD as background. Most of it is pretty easy... start with a line or a curve and then extrude it into a surface - I find working in surfaces better for my modeling than working in solids. Build a framework of lines for the hull and then fit a surface over it. A lot of it is actually 2D modeling.

For me the difficult part was when I discovered that Rhino does not do a great job of flattening out curved surfaces automatically. It takes some planning ahead - for me at least - to get something like a hull shape to come out decently as a flat drawing. Hmm. Maybe I actually need to do a build thread on building a model in Rhino. Mind you, there are some people who REALLY know the program unlike I, who only have bothered to learn the bits that are of immediate use to me. Still, I am beginning design of a new ship and could use that. I'll think on it.


Carl

[Ashrunner]

I'm like Ted. I have tried every 3d program out there and just can't wrap my mind around what they offer.

However, I bought a copy of TurboCAD several years ago, and immediately was able to pick up how to use the program. All my World Famous Flintstones models were done entirely in TurboCAD. What has helped me is I can look at a shape and "flatten" it in my mind and then draw it from there. It was a lot easier to do several years ago. These days, I "flatten" the object, and reach for the mouse to start drawing, and I forget what I flattened. 8v(

I am working on two aircraft right now, both of which are taking an extraordinary long time to complete because of my lack of short-term memory.

But I still enjoy doing it. And one of these days, I'll add to my World Famous line of models.

[Lex]

Nice design!! --As everyone above me... I find Rhino had a very forgiving learning curve, One can virtually become a cardmodel designer from nothing in a week...

[maurice]

That was a hilarious bit of algebra Ted.

As you can stitch very large drug, bullet and ER addicted people back together I'm sure you can cope with a bit of CAD. But reading what you've said about where you're coming from I'd like to suggest you stay in 2D for the present.

And this is where I think I start getting into trouble with the Rhino addicted experten. True it has an unfolding ability which can be made to work if used properly but it's not the best place to learn or do 2D CAD.

TurboCAD LE, free from
http://www.freecad.com/dcd/CAD_Programs____PCs/index-4.html
will make you stay in 2D or you can get a later version for a pitance off ebay (version 10.5 was a good one) and that will allow you to stay in 2D completely seperate from the 3D part. As Ash says it's relatively easy to use but there is a learning curve of course.

Anyhows let me know if you want to try a leisurely free pre-retirement course and if and when you get kitted out and we can run through setting up your bitmap as a background image and drawing CAD type lines curves and things over the top of it. This will save on solder.

[Gil]

TurboCAD 15 now includes an unfold command. Wondering whether anyone has tried it out yet? It's price has also increased to the point that it's now out of reach of most hobbyists ($495.00 ?).

I still recommend Rhino as the best software for model design.

+Gil

[CMDRTED]

Thanks all for the advice and assurances on 3d. Maurice , Carl, and Gil I may reread the archives and take you all up on how to. There are a few hulls out there in my "wish list" to do. I've been rethinking strategies on the hull and overall ship design. The gif file I was using turns out for real is only a postcard size. It was this that I was baseing my prelim designs on and it turn out the resolution was horrible for the smaller details. I fiddled around with the controls and at least doubled the resolution allowing a bit finer details. Of course I sorta had to kinda enlarge the hull to 1/250 scale, so here are some prelims on the mark 3.5, formers etc...

[CMDRTED]

I tried to skin the beasts forerard parts in a one piece hull side as this worked in 1/400 scale, but enlarged the card just didn't make the compounf curves of the bow. Shown here in pics 1 and in the 2nd pic I tried to "force" fit the thing onto the formers but it gave that starved dog look and took some nasty bends....

[CMDRTED]

Well I then thought and thought and retried by spiltting the hull up at curved upper deck. I then figured out the dimensions thru a bunch of trial fits and I'm almost ready to start detailing the hull plates in earnest... no one close on ID yet. Another few maudlin hints, the main armament turrets shared the same with a revolutionary designed light cruiser. I don't think this nation ever used the same turret on other ships.

[Phil]

You should see how I design in 2D, I have a 19" flat screen that I take measurements with a ruler and pieces of solder for the curves, then flatten them out.

Solder...BRILLIANT!
I was using strips of paper...thanx for the tip!

[CMDRTED]

Sometimes the simplest of tools! Here is the stb hull sides all detailed up so far, nearly there with the hull. After this the simple cylinders etc will be ?cake? The port view is the prelim solid colour hull. The other pic show the extra framework needed for the hull to deck flair. The last 2 pics show the almost final. More on the 'morrrow!

[maurice]

Another few maudlin hints, ......

You do realise of course that if the resulting model isn't a sufficiently accurate representation of the original ....................... you're in strife.

Meanwhile you're doing very well with these cave wall techniques.:)

[CMDRTED]

Maurice, are you actually counting the portholes? I deliberatey picked this ship for a few reasons, one being all the ships in this class were very similar only their war modifications were at dispute. No true drawings actually exist as far as anyone in this hemispere are aware. The other medium claims to have the right lines but their info was from very few pics, I agree with some of them as far as the hull is concerned however the plan views are still in a sort of dispute. So my strategy is to take the largest consensus of build reports and do that version, so in my mind I just have to get close enough!

[maurice]

No true drawings actually exist as far as anyone in this hemispere are aware.

Well that likely makes it Japanese.
Some of the escort ships they tried to mass produce late in the war were very, very slow. But the location of the focsle break still worries, most seem to have been further forward.

[CMDRTED]

Very good reasoning. I also picked this particular ship for it's uniqueness. To look at her you wouldn"t think she was particularly Japanese. In fact when I first saw the pic I thought she was a captured war prize. There is no outstanding performance or specs for this class, they were tubs ,relatively luxurious in accomadations, not fast, not well armed, not armoured, but kinda a cool concept. Also I read more in the Japanese cruisers of the pacific book, (yes it's Japanese), the turrets were used in more than the other ship I was mentioning. But not many.

[Don Boose]

Katori-class training cruiser?

Don

[CharlieC]

Sounds reasonable since:

- the approximate length from CmdrTed's cutting mat is about 360-380 feet. The Katoris were 425 ft long so it's in the right ball park.

- about the only pre-WW2 experimental cruiser the Japanese produced was the Yubari (1923) - this had 5.5"/50 guns - same as the Katoris main armament.

- The Katoris were quite slow - 18 knots with a mixed (steam + diesel) powerplant.


Regards,

Charlie

[maurice]

If I give them enough help they get there eventually:p

[Don Boose]

It was a nice-looking ship. Good choice, Ted!

Maurice: I may be slow, but I'm clumsy.

Don

[Golden Bear]

...and I thought that it was something obscure!

[CMDRTED]

Good job gentlemen! I picked this class because it was a unique design for a JApanese ship. No huge pagodas or fair shaped hulls, this is a first venture into cad but hopefully not my last. I'm going to wimp out for now and keep the config as early/pre WWll, with the torpedos and limited AA arms as well as Depth charges. It wouldn't be much harder to design them as later it would just be a PIA to build all them 25mms etc as I'm designing her. She is a cadet ship for training, for them and now me. Twin drives, diesel and steam turbines should have given her some decent speed, but her waterline length to width etc, all things to do with aquanautical design and the limited amount of boilers to produce steam limited her to a max of 18 knots. And that probably with a following sea! I did read somewhere that the Cutty Sark made it past 20 knots in one instance. According to LaCroix she was roomy inside with huge classroom spaces and quarters, making the class desireable, later in the war , to be used as flag ships and flotilla leaders. I included the little deck shear fwd, but there is also an almost imperceptable aft shear upwards that I will not include. I think the account which was verbal said it was less than half a foot in @25 feet. I think the nature tendancy for paper ships to bow with time would produce that much so I didn't do that. I still haven't decided which ship so far, but will have to when designing the fwd bridge decks as this is where they differed from the start. One has 4 twin 25mm mounts the other 2 with 4 saluting guns etc. All minor details but the ist 2 levels up have to be a little differant. well onwards, more later.

[maurice]

This of course was not the only seaplane carrying training ship built by the Japanese just before the war, one of which survives to this day as a museum.

Doubtless Ted's model ,whilst eschewing the 35 or so later war 25mm guns, will include a fully detailed Nakajima E8N1 (Dave) sitting on the catapult.



(just stirring Ted to give GB his something obscure:))

[Golden Bear]

Just to show that I DO know a little bit about ships that didn't burn coal...

[maurice]

In spite of the obvious similarity of the profiles the 2 classes were completely different sizes. c 2000 against c 6000 tons with the two profiles to approximate scale in this image.
2 ships, classed as training sloops, 1 broken up 1946 the other not discarded untill1976 before being preserved.

[shrike]

I can see how those two could be really confusing through a periscope. I could throw ranging WAY off. I wonder if there was an incidence of either of them being attacked and the attack failing just because of that.

[Golden Bear]

Big oops on my part. I did that after waking up at 4:10 this morning with the unrepaired shoulder in complete agony. Many apologies. I'll go back to my cave.



Carl

[maurice]

No need to go back to the cave on my account Carl.

Would a pic of a garuda help ?
Or would it help Don to get the nationality by knowing that, after the war, the US were able to allege that the ships' owners hadn't been at war with them.

[CharlieC]

Possibly HTMS Maeklong built in Japan, commissioned 1937 and finally decommissioned in 1996 when it was set in concrete in the Chulachomklao Fort Museum.

(The Garuda isn't just an Indonesian airline of dubious repute but is the emblem of the Thai royal family).

Regards,

Charlie

[maurice]

Give that man a banana.

It really isn't the best way to preserve a ship as corrosion below the waterline is provoked and cannot be dealt with.
When I first became aware of these ships a few years ago it was at
http://www.navy.mi.th/NavyHistory/Maeklong_Museum/Maeklong_Museum.htm
Good but unfortunatly only in Thai and now a Google search throws up more, including
http://www.paknam.com/phrachula.html
http://www.paknam.com/phrachula3.html
which shows the Watanabe WS-103 seaplane that these ships carried.
Also p 411 Conways 1922-1946 (but they're way out with the decommission date) and Google Earth at

[Don Boose]

Maurice: " Would a pic of a garuda help ? Or would it help Don to get the nationality by knowing that, after the war, the US were able to allege that the ships' owners hadn't been at war with them."

The pic of the Garuda would have helped identify the country and so would the reference to the strange non-combative belligerent WWII status of Thailand, but I must admit that I was totally unaware of the existence of this ship until this fascinating discussion took place.

Don

[shrike]

Isn't the official story that the King of Thailand (Rama VI(?)) was "on vacation" throughout the war and thus unable to intervene?

[CMDRTED]

Morning all, I finally got some drive back and am nearly finished with this project started over 2 years ago. I had to redesign everything but am actually done with the parts. I settled on 1/400 scale waterline to match my pile of JSC ships. The parts are done they just have to be tested a bit better than the prototype pics shown here...

[CMDRTED]

Not having a huge source of reference material for this particular ship, I settled on the IJN Kashima in her 1941 configuration. There is a fantastic plastic build of this in 1/700 scale by Jeff Linn on the Steel Navy site.This is what I used for the source of details. Even at 1/400 I couldn't get what this guy did in 1/700. Anyhows I'mhaving major camera strife, I have 4 of them and none seem to want to cooperate. My trusty canon 4 mega-pickles which has served me well in all my previous posts was destroyed by my son on his class trip to Germany. I'm using a hodge podge of relics found in our junk drawer.

[kenlwest]

Looks very good!

Ken