Not a blueprint as such but a ground plan of one of those really old stone dwellings on the Orkneys. I like it for some reason, it looks cosey even as a drawing.
>>5061 This was my favourite thing to do on my engineering degree. I would stay in the lab to use the CAD software and make detailed engineering drawings of nothing in particular.
>>5066 I work next to the staff at my company who do it, it's really interesting. I like incorporating their stuff in my work because it has a groovy Blade Runner vibe.
>>5067 They've got all kinds of methods of doing it, they deploy laser scanners into worksites to gather bearings, they then map that data to produce renderings showing how structures change over time. It lets you pick up potential problems and neutralise them before they become critical. You get lovely time lapse renderings showing stuff over periods of days, weeks etc.
Does anyone know much about town/city planning? I like to try and plan cities for roleplaying games but all I can ever really come up with is squares of houses surrounding a market. Ofcourse theres waste channels and such.
I don't know, all I'm really after is a list of principles that might help me think of previously unconsidered aspects of city living.
It's slightly off topic but there are books published about the design and planning of several new towns in the UK such as Milton Keynes and Welwyn Garden City:
Historically, models were integral to the process of shipbuilding.
One of the trickiest parts of designing a ship is lofting, the process of working out how to clad a three-dimensional hull shape using two-dimensional planks or steel plates. Naval architects lacked the mathematical understanding to do this purely on paper until well into the 20th century, so they relied heavily on scale models to plan and communicate the hull design.
Modelmakers were in a sense the CAD operators of their day. Working entirely by hand, they could shape complex curves accurate to a fraction of a millimetre. Models were used to advertise, to communicate designs with clients, to work out tricky technical problems and as a final reference for manufacturing.
It's astonishing to think that hundreds of men riveting together thousands of tons of steel were all reliant on a little wooden model in the shipwright's office.
>>5074 I don't suppose you'd share more on boat construction, would you? A few paragraphs in general would be great, then I could pick out bits for elaboration (assuming this isn't too much trouble for you). alternatively, do you know of any resources for me to study myself? All I can find through online searching is boat building companies and such.
The only way I can think of building boats at the moment is starting with wishing bone shaped 'ribs' that scale in size then nailing planks along them. If this is right, is there some formula or rule I can use to get the right scale?
I'm particularly interested in traditional techniques in boat/ship building. After reading Robinson Cruesoe I've been taken with the idea of building a small ship and sailing it, most likely, to the bottom of the ocean.
The term you're looking for is "naval architecture".
Ships are traditionally constructed from the ground-up. First the keel is laid, which acts as the backbone of the boat. Then ribs or bulkheads are added, creating a framework which can be clad and decked.
The process of drawing out a ship's lines is done by cutting the vessel into numerous imaginary sections in three planes - vertically across the width (the body plan), vertically along the length (the sheer plan) and horizontally along the length (the waterline plan). Drawing lines the traditional way is as much art as science. Small fishing boats and ferries were often designed by sailors themselves, using traditional designs that were handed down by word-of-mouth.
Drawing lines was traditionally done by eye, based on known characteristics of various hull forms - a hull with a deep and round belly is stable but slow, long tapering lines make a boat fast but limits cargo capacity and so on. As our understanding of hydrodynamics improved, we learned more theoretically rigorous ways of designing a hull form; Computer simulation and CAD is now the norm amongst commercial and racing architects, but many designers of pleasure craft still do things with pencil and paper.
Bulkheads can be cut directly from the body plan; Lofting involves tabulations of measurements from all three plans. The main difficulty involved in lofting comes from the complexity of the mathematics required to describe space curves (curved planes in three dimensions). A diverse range of lofting techniques evolved to allow parts to be accurately drawn and cut using simpler methods; Nonetheless, a skilled loftsman may still need several weeks to loft a round hull.
Lofting a smooth hull precisely is enormously difficult, so many boats designed to be constructed by amateurs are designed with a multi-chined hull, built with hard edges and simple curves. Popular modern examples include the Mirror and Optimist dinghies and many yachts designed by Steve Roberts; Traditional examples include scows and junks.
Modern boat builders can take advantage of newer materials (plywood, fibreglass, epoxy) and modern methods (stitch-and-glue construction) to build excellent boats simply and quickly. It is now completely feasible to build a good dinghy in a few weekends, or a small ocean-going yacht in a year or two of evenings and weekends. Some very simple designs like the Puddleduck Racer can be built in less than five days and for just a couple of hundred pounds fully rigged. Architects like John Welsford specialise in designing tough, adventurous yachts that can be built by inexperienced amateurs; His Fafnir and Swaggie designs are masterful examples of economy. Traditional clinker or carvel construction is vastly more laborious and tends to produce heavier and less efficient hulls.
With that said, if you're interested in sailing, you can buy a good second-hand boat for astonishingly little money. A competent racing dinghy can be had for as little as £500, £3000 will get you a tatty but sound yacht suitable for coastal journeys, and you could quite realistically plan a round-the-world voyage for under £10,000. Fibreglass hulls are impervious to most kinds of decay so modern boats never really die, they just get ugly. Many owners of small yachts are eager to find volunteers to crew for them, so just give your local yacht club a call if you'd like to learn the ropes. It's useful to have an RYA Competent Crew certificate (~£400) but all you really need is a set of oilskins and a good attitude.
Sailing off into the sunset on your own little boat is a completely achievable ambition. Nathan Whitworth produced a fascinating blog and series of videos about his adventures on Kudu, a 21 foot Corribee that he bought for a couple of grand on eBay and fitted out whilst living aboard. After learning to sail by crewing other people's boats at the Little Ship Club on the Thames, he set off to sail around Britain on his own.
>>5077 >With that said, if you're interested in sailing, you can buy a good second-hand boat for astonishingly little money. A competent racing dinghy can be had for as little as £500
Dinghy sailing is a ludicrously economical hobby. A dinghy like a Kestrel is often around £300 with its trolley. Club fees can be a few quid but nothing extortionate.
This Miracle is £250 with 14 hours remaining. Dinghies often sell for so cheap that they'll be bought on ebay just so they can be cannibalised for parts.
If you want to get into sailing you should do a few RYA courses. It's not a hobby you can really just get into by yourself, a few days of training will save you a lot of bother and danger to yourself and others.
For what it's worth I fucking hate sailing I just know this shit because my dad tried to get me into it (bless him).
