For those of you into board design I thought I would walk you through a little challenge I have had. For years I have been designing in Alias which is a sophisticated design tool widely used by the automotive design studios globally. The surf industry is dominated by a few CAD software's Shape 3D and BoardCAD being two of the widely used ones. None of these programs will read complex Nurbs surface which all my boards are and it is nearly impossible to find a surfboard CNC that is not driven by one of the surf specific systems. So in my frustration I got a one month Shape 3D licence to see if I could re-create my more complex designs.
I started with a board I have recently been messing around with,which is a double inverted V bottom shape....interesting hey!!! I created an SDL file from the nurbs surface I had done and brought the SDL into Shape 3D as a "ghost board" which I can trace or use as reference. I then re-created all the curves and sections and rebuilt it. It took me a while to figure out how to do the double inverted V as the workflow is really different but I eventually got there. You can't get the detail as precise as a more sophisticated design system, especially around the nose but it is fine for a core which needs some hand sanding anyway before it is sandwiched.
Now to re-do all my existing designs

Nice one!

I've been using an older free version of Shape 3d (It's less crippled than the current free version) for backyard surfboard shaping for a few years. I just use it for outlines and rockers and let the rest happen on the stands. Mostly I find it hugely useful as a comparison tool: how does this rocker compare to that one that has the same overall lift but a slightly different character through the middle for instance.
In the limited way that I use the program it's been a massive help and timesaver to the age old analogue way I've been working for decades.

That's just color.
And that shape is OLD.

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LeeD said..
That's just color.
And that shape is OLD.

Thanks for your constructive feedback.

For the record they are Black and White and grey tones....this is colour.

Decoration is foo foo.
Shape is important.

Im no designer but can see the shape of it

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LeeD said..
Decoration is foo foo.
Shape is important.

It's possible that the 'decoration' could be giving information regarding the shape....

Yes...That so called decoration is giving me lots of information about the shape. They are highlight lines. On the deck i don't really care how smooth they are but on the bottom they indicate the rate of twist and how smooth the transition is as the inverted V runs along the board. Highlighting is a big part of designing body panels on cars and I am very experienced in reading what they say to determine shape. It's no different to using strip lights in a shaping booth.

Without boring you s...tless this is highlighting 101........Best way to demonstrate what the highlight lines are telling you is by doing this. Grab a piece of something flat, shiny and flexible. Hold it up facing a fluorescent light or some form of strip light (light shining through Venetian blinds). Now tilt the material at different angles and watch the light reflection position change as you do so. If you keep the material flat this this light on the surface shows the angle. So in the model I can see the rate of angle change by those highlight lines and how smooth the transition is as it changes. Now bend the material and again watch the light on the surface. As you increase the rate of curvature the lines narrow and bunch together so again this is a great way of viewing concave or convex shapes and seeing the rate of curvature change.

Wish I had access to those features in the program too.... unfortunately I can't justify the cost.

Why double inverted v rather than double concave? Experiment or do you know what the outcome is likely to be?

Just play visuals.

LeeD, the colour as you call it is similar to using the side lights in a shaping bay. It highlights the consistency of the shape and shows the contours and lines. There are different tools you can use in this program to to highlight different things. The same as switching to different lights in a shaping bay.

Seems that he's a Troll. Ignore him.

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MikeyS said..
Why double inverted v rather than double concave? Experiment or do you know what the outcome is likely to be?

I could give you a whole lot of BS but yes basically an experiment. Logic if there is any....easier to build accurately, hand finishing a concave with varying radius accurately has to be difficult. Theoretically flat V panels have less surface area than the equivalent depth concave. The angle at the rail is less acute than with a concave so it should release better.
Cons....If I get one built I guess I will find out if there are any.

Thanks Martin

Exactly...cad is only the basic shape..HAND finishing determines how it works.
CAD is for MASS PRODUCTION, to save time.

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LeeD said..
Exactly...cad is only the basic shape..HAND finishing determines how it works.
CAD is for MASS PRODUCTION, to save time.

Rubbish. CAD is a method of communication. In this case, it's the method Mr Love uses to communicate to the shaper the exact shape he requires.

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LeeD said..
Exactly...cad is only the basic shape..HAND finishing determines how it works.
CAD is for MASS PRODUCTION, to save time.

I think the design determines how it works and in my case i do that design on a screen.

Anyone can get close, YOU just said handfinishing is required.

And tons of "CAD" sails, fins, and boards are just crap.

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LeeD said..
And tons of "CAD" sails, fins, and boards are just crap.

In your opinion.

And it's not CAD's fault if it was the case.

Choosing science, math, and engineering for everything is a recipe for disaster.
Gotta be at least 30% human decisions, and more often 70%.

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LeeD said..
That's just color.
And that shape is OLD.

Stop being a tool with not constructive comments, when did you last shape a board.

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LeeD said..
Choosing science, math, and engineering for everything is a recipe for disaster.
Gotta be at least 30% human decisions, and more often 70%.

actually agree here.......you were a tool earlier but this comment is actually pretty correct.
Problem is that everyone sails with a different style, one sail might be great for one person and the next bloke hates it.

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LeeD said..
Choosing science, math, and engineering for everything is a recipe for disaster.
Gotta be at least 30% human decisions, and more often 70%.

This has nothing to do with CAD nor CNC shaping. They are both tools in the hand of a craftsman.

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LeeD said..
Choosing science, math, and engineering for everything is a recipe for disaster.
Gotta be at least 30% human decisions, and more often 70%.

YOURE RIGHT. CAD cant be used for EVERYTHING. Still requires HUMAN ideas n designs n input to actually get an image to look at. Saves having to hand draw the image over n over as you DESIGN n TEST what works. Then if required can be mass produced to be hand finished n tested.
BUT IT SURE BEATS SCRATCHING AN IMAGE ON YOUR CAVE WALL WITH A STICK
Dontcha reckon?

I think there is a big misunderstanding of what CAD is. It means Computer Aided Design and that term can describe a very wide variety of activities. CAM is Computer Aided Manufacturing which in this case would describe the machining of the core. They are 2 different things, one the design process the other part of the manufacturing process.
I do my design work on a computer, it 'aides" me, it does not do the design, I do. The human is designing the board I am just using a computer as the design medium. It takes skill and knowledge the computer cannot do it without the human input. AIl of this might change this in the future though at least to some degree, I hope not.

Here is an example of CAD...I am sure most of you would not have considered it so, an awesome sketch by Ewan Kingsbury of the Holden Virtual Show car released at Bathurst last year A design theme sketch done using photoshop...so a computer aiding the designer...it is still hand sketched and rendered but on a screen instead of a piece of paper. Clearly CAD does not stiffle creativity and imagination.

Don't confuse CAD with CAM.






And yes Lee the board still has to be hand finished but that has nothing to do with how it was designed. Ideally I would love a robot to be able to do this as well as it won't have been on the whacky tobacy the night before...

A hammer made today works like a hammer made in 1918.

Design programs, CNC machines, hot wires and planers are all just tools a shaper can use to build a board any way he chooses.
LeeD is a tool that would be terrible at building anything with his ignorance and closed mind on how things work

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LeeD said..
A hammer made today works like a hammer made in 1918.

But designing it on a screen, then making it, does not mean the hammer will not work.
That's what you've said.

The D stands for Design. You seem to think humans are doing nothing when they use CAD and the computer does it all?

Try and copy a board's rocker line and shape it in foam completely by hand and templates you made, no CAD. Then come back and talk.
(BTW I do just that as I don't have time to learn Shape3D yet - but I acknowledge I take 10x longer.)

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LeeD said..
A hammer made today works like a hammer made in 1918.

Ask someone who uses a hammer regularly and they will tell you a good modern hammer will work better than a 100 year old one .

Anyway, back to the original reason I posted. After using high end software to design my boards I was sceptical about the abilities of Shape3D however the more I have used it the more I learn and appreciate it. I think if anybody wants to have a dabble with board design they should download the free version( a bit limited though) and have a play.