The other day someone asked me if I could work up a tugboat for him and he suggested the John G. Alden tug Luna. I have done a few, smaller, tugboats in the past, in 1/8 and 1/12 scale, but I thought this might be great fun as the ship itself is a just short of a hundred feet, which give a model size of 48 3/4", which is a nice size.
I found a set of lines at the "usual place', the museum at MIT and bought them. Combined with the drawings from the Luna Preservation Society, I was able to come up with an excellent 3D shape for the model.
As I have described recently, I design my models in SolidWorks but do use a dedicated product for making hull shapes. Considering this is not a complex hull shape like, say, a J-class sailboat, I am pretty sure I could have done an adequate job directly in SolidWorks, using the various surface features, but it's faster in Rhino, and the end-result was quite acceptable.
The first picture shows the line drawing from the MIT museum. They are available at a very reasonable cost. Of course, since there is a copyright on the drawing, I have reproduced a tiny portion here. Next there is a line drawing from the Luna Preservation Society website. There are a few drawings on the site but there is not enough information in them to actually create a 3D model. One really needs the drawing from MIT to figure out the shape. Next, there are pictures of the 3D model,, inserted into the design program.
Note that the side-view is a preliminary shape, and it was improved later. The isometric view has the corrected shape. I guess they should have been in the reverse order for this post.
Next, I need to get some details from the builder, to see what kind of frame set he wants, how much space he would like to have inside the model, whether he wants openings and framing for the cabin, and whether he wants the cabin itself.
Of course, I will also offer to make him parts (bollards, winches, ports, etc) for 3D resin printing later.
I found a set of lines at the "usual place', the museum at MIT and bought them. Combined with the drawings from the Luna Preservation Society, I was able to come up with an excellent 3D shape for the model.
As I have described recently, I design my models in SolidWorks but do use a dedicated product for making hull shapes. Considering this is not a complex hull shape like, say, a J-class sailboat, I am pretty sure I could have done an adequate job directly in SolidWorks, using the various surface features, but it's faster in Rhino, and the end-result was quite acceptable.
The first picture shows the line drawing from the MIT museum. They are available at a very reasonable cost. Of course, since there is a copyright on the drawing, I have reproduced a tiny portion here. Next there is a line drawing from the Luna Preservation Society website. There are a few drawings on the site but there is not enough information in them to actually create a 3D model. One really needs the drawing from MIT to figure out the shape. Next, there are pictures of the 3D model,, inserted into the design program.
Note that the side-view is a preliminary shape, and it was improved later. The isometric view has the corrected shape. I guess they should have been in the reverse order for this post.
Next, I need to get some details from the builder, to see what kind of frame set he wants, how much space he would like to have inside the model, whether he wants openings and framing for the cabin, and whether he wants the cabin itself.
Of course, I will also offer to make him parts (bollards, winches, ports, etc) for 3D resin printing later.
