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Delftship Files

Joined
Sep 11, 2021
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Location
Houston, Texas
Hello,

I‘m brand new to this site but not to canoeing. I’m currently designing a solo canoe for adventure canoe races. I have the general shape in one of my softwares (Rhinoceros), but I’d like to get it in Delftship so I can run calculations on it and tweak accordingly. I still have a lot to learn with it and currently just getting more familiar with it.

How many of you use Delftship (free version) and would any of you mind sharing any canoe design files with me so I can study them within the software? I’m sure this would help me understand it better if I can view some completed designs. I would use them for reference only as I don’t plan to copy them in any way.

On another note for those that have designed canoes with Delftship: Do you start from scratch, use background images and create a hull from plans you already have, or a mixture of both?

My ultimate goal is to design and build a solo boat to paddle and hopefully complete the Texas Water Safari in it. It’s a 260 mile race here in Texas. I raced in 2018 in a boat I built but only made it 200 miles before I was DQ’d. The 2 things I learned from that boat is that I could have used more freeboard, but definitely more stability. The tippiness of that boat started taking its toll on my core 150 miles in.

I wasn’t sure if this is where I should post this, or if it should be in a different category. Moderators, please move if t should reside elsewhere on the site.

I welcome and appreciate any help offered.

Cheers,

Jeff
 
Hi Jeff - I sat down and learned Delftship last fall and built a few canoes from the designs over the winter. I have a number of different kinds of canoe models in delftship, most of them dead end boats that I will never build, and should never be built. I started learning the software by scanning some drawings of old birchbark designs in the Adney and Chapell book and made models in the software from them. I have also scanned some of the canoecraft designs and played around with those in the software. I would guess that anybody using delftship to design a boat starts with an existing model of some kind rather than starting from scratch but I might be wrong. The boats I built started as basic canoe shapes that I modified according to measurements I took on some existing production boats, then tweaking and scaling is various ways. There are also some canoe designs you can open from the delftship database, which you access from within the software.

The learning curve for the software was a bit steep for me, and what all the numbers mean is something I still don't understand. I bought John Winters "Shape of the Canoe" which helped, but it's all still mostly a mystery to me. To me there is still a disconnect between the effects of some design changes I make and the software output. I attribute this to my ignorance, and not anything else. If you're looking to design a canoe that will perform in some expected way, there will be trial and error. You may end up building a boat that looks good on paper but doesn't perform as expected. Oh, and I did find out that it is possible to design a boat that is very difficult to build with strips.

My suggestion is that you find a production canoe that is close to what you're after, then after making a model that is true to the original, try to modify it in small ways in the direction you like. Once you are happy with the design you should know that delftship doesn't just spit out standard plans. There are more steps, with other software, to get you there. I am only moderately computer literate, so getting an actual plan out of delftship was another thing, but I eventually did it. I can help you with that if you need it.

I tried to attach a couple of delftship files, but it doesn't allow it. You can PM me and I can email them to you. Mark
 
I don’t know anything about Delftship, and only a little about the Texas Water Safari.

I expect you recognize that everything design-wise becomes a compromise; initial stability achieved via greater width or a flatter bottom becomes a trade off with speed and efficiency. I do not favor hulls with poor initial stability, and by the time I get to the secondary stability without a ready brace I’m swimming.

The bottom may be the hardest part to deduce a suitable racing design; everyone has their own “sweet spot” among shallow arch, shallow vee or more rounded bottom shapes. If I want my core muscles to ache a “twitchy” round bottomed hull will do it.

Not what you are asking, and I also expect that you have specific outfitting expectations for a Water Safari boat, but you should be able to reduce core muscle strain in any boat via outfitting. I still have the shoulder and arm strength to paddle all day, but otherwise the core muscle endurance of an old man. A lot of boat stability, efficiency, comfort can be achieved using some minicel and other braces, all of which combines to reduce strain on my core.

I’m a sitter, not a kneeler. Always a foot brace or pedals, and that always paired with a low back band, one that doesn’t interfere with torso rotation but provides some oppositional force, helping “lock me in place” on the seat. Those two things probably help lessen core muscle strain as much as anything else.

Almost always partial spray covers or partial hard decks for wind and wave and splash. Full decks or covers would be better, but I prefer the entry and egress ease of a more open “cockpit” area. Decks or covers donothing to help core muscles. . . . . except eliminating bilge water sloshing around.

Almost always a bucket seat, or slightly canted contour, so that my derriere is held firmly in place. I’m a comfort wuss, and don’t get out of the boat very often, so always a pad strapped in place on a contour seat, or RidgeRest foam glued to a bucket. I may be a wuss, but I’m not a butt hurt wuss.

Or knee hurt. Always, in every boat, “knee bumpers”; some shaped minicel padding under the gunwales, so I can press my knees, spread at my most comfortable leg distance, into the foam to better brace when needed, or gently press my knees when not. Those knee bumpers get shaped for my physiology; some simply carved to cup my knees and upper calves.

P9010006 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

The textured exercise foam on the floor is there to help hold my heels in place with feet pressed against the foot brace/pedals. If I were outfitting a racing boat I might, after a few discerning test paddles, consider installing heel blocks. Every little bit of locked-in-place helps reduce strain on my aging core muscles.

Some larger knee bumpers are additionally contoured so that I can tuck my legs underneath like thigh braces. The ones below are massive, and ugly, and extremely efficient; I can press my knees/legs against the edges, or tuck my legs beneath a la thigh braces. Wish I’d had a bun of grey minicel.

P2160531 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

Between the contour or bucket seat (1), foot brace (+2), anti-slip heel pads (+2), back band (+1) and knee bumpers (+2) I have eight padded points of contact with the boat. I want my boat to be “The most comfortable seat in the house”, so I don’t need to get achy out and stretch my legs. On trips with friends when they need a shore break I’ll hop out briefly, then get back in my boat and Barcalounger relax.

I have done a little racing, and for me a very long day is 30 miles of paddling. But much of what I paddle on shorter trips can be open water windy exposed; into the winds is an acid test for core muscles, and I want every bit of comfort and efficiency I can get from the outfitting.

I can’t help but ponder, exhausted and near hallucinating after 60+ hours, coming to Spindrift to find it windy and choppy. Please keep us posted on the design and, eventually, how to follow your track during the Water Safari.
 
I've made a handful of boats I designed in Delftship. I've always started from scratch. I'd usually have some hull measurements from a another similarly sized/shaped canoe to give me some reference points but these were on paper only, not a background image in the software to model against.

Having Rhino you must have some CAD experience which will probably speed up the learning curve. I, like Dogbrain, found it very steep and difficult to get started and still don't understand many of the numbers but I was always happy with the results after lots of tinkering around to get what I wanted. I learned a lot but have forgotten most of it now that I haven't opened the software in 4 years.

John Winters Shape of the Canoe is a big help and I've read and re-read it many times. It makes a little more sense each time and helps re-affirm that I'm not going to make any radical breakthroughs and to trust the words of people who know much more than I. Oftentimes, especially when starting, I'd make changes that had the opposite effect I expected on drag calculations. I assume Winters and Delftship know more than I do so take them at their word.

I'd happily share files but they're all stored on a computer that itself is stored away and I doubt I'll be dragging it out anytime soon.

Alan
 
If you haven't already, check out this build thread: https://www.canoetripping.net/threads/multiday-adventure-race-canoe-composite.93560/

The guy built a very impressive unlimited C1 for ultra races, composite construction from a stripper plug.

(As an aside, I found that 2019 thread without difficulty just using a couple keywords I recalled. The Xenforo search is much better, no need to leave the reservation and search -site: from outside.)
 
If you haven't already, check out this build thread: https://www.canoetripping.net/threads/multiday-adventure-race-canoe-composite.93560/

The guy built a very impressive unlimited C1 for ultra races, composite construction from a stripper plug.

(As an aside, I found that 2019 thread without difficulty just using a couple keywords I recalled. The Xenforo search is much better, no need to leave the reservation and search -site: from outside.)
I did see that thread and was highly impressed. My design will be a modified boat similar to his but not to that degree. I’ll see if I can post a picture of my preliminary design that I 3d printed.
 
Here is my preliminary design. Once 3d printed I’ve noticed a couple of tweaks I want to make. BEA93629-3CD2-4F90-B9D2-5B9E9CA8F94F.jpeg After that I hope to recreate in Delftship to run some calculations on it.
 
Oh, since you already have a digital model have you tried to import it directly? I'm sure you've looked into that since you appear to be computer savvy. If you can make a model like that I think you'll probably be up and running in Delftship in no time. I'll send you a couple delftship files.

Mark
 
(As an aside, I found that 2019 thread without difficulty just using a couple keywords I recalled. The Xenforo search is much better, no need to leave the reservation and search -site: from outside.)

As I mentioned in another thread, I bought an additional license for an add-on called Xenforo Enhanced Search (XFES), which also generates the Similar Threads feature. Unfortunately, I think the site's visibility to search engines such as Google, Bing, etc., began to diminish for some reason even before migration, and it will probably be a while before their web-crawling robots build up a complete external index for the migrated site. Meanwhile, I hope XFES does provide a good internal search capability.
 
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