Auto p pla pl ate
®
For Windows® For
User’s Manual
Autoship Systems Corporation Suite 1451 - 409 Granville Street Vancouver BC Canada V6C 1T2 Copyright ! 2008 Autoship Systems Corporation ®
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation ®
AutoCAD
Inc. is a registered trademark of Autodesk, Inc.
Release 9.2
Information contained in this document is subject to change without further notice. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic of mechanical, for any purpose, without the express permission of Autoship Systems Corporation. Copyright ! 2008 Autoship Systems Corporation. All rights reserved.
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation. AutoCAD is a registered trademark of Autodesk Inc. All other product names are trademarks, registered trademarks, or service marks of their respective owners. Autoship Systems Corporation cannot attest to the accuracy of this information. In addition, terms suspected of being trademarks, registered trademarks, or service marks have been appropriately italicized. Use of a term in this book should not be regarded as a validity of any trademark, registered trademarks, or service mark.
Autoship Systems Corporation Corporation Suite 1451 409 Granville Street Vancouver BC Canada V6C 1T2 Tel: (604) 254-41 254-4171 71 Fax: (604) 254-5171 www.autoship.com
Table of Co Contents ntents
Chapter 1 - Getting Started
1
1.0 Introducing Auto plate plate
1
1.1 System Requirements
2
1.2 Installing Auto plate
2
1.2.1 System Initialization - Installation Wizard 1.2.2 ASC Program Authorization 1.2.3 Auto 1.2.3 Auto plate Setup Program Program 1.2.4 Lock Setting
1.3 Starting and Exiting Auto plate
4
1.3.1 Starting 1.3.2 Exiting 1.3.3 The Auto The Auto plate 9 Navigator Navigator
1.4 Online Help
5
Chapter 2 - Quick Overview
7
Chapter 3 - Reference
11
3.0 What is Plate Expansion? 3.1 Overview
12
3.2 The Auto plate User Interface
13
3.2.1 The Menus and Help system 3.2.2 New Control Bar Icons
3.3 Points and Curves in Auto plate
14
i
3.3.1 New Curve Options
3.4 Preparing an Autoship Project for Auto plate
15
3.5 Starting a New Auto plate Project
16
3.6 Stock
17
3.7 Setting Up a Classification
18
3.8 Plate Boundaries
19
3.8.1 Requirements for Plate Boundaries 3.8.2 Tips for Creating Plate Boundary Curves
3.9 Creating a Plate
21
3.10 Plate Selection
22
3.11 The Plate Viewer
23
3.12 Expansion
24
3.12.1 Directionality 3.12.2 Condition 3.12.3 Extra Stock 3.12.4 Mesh 3.12.5 Expansion Failure
3.13 Templates
27
3.14 Pin Jig
28
3.15 Reports
29
3.16 Panels
30
3.16.1 Creating a New Panel 3.16.2 Selecting Panels 3.16.3 Creating a Panel Pin Jig
3.17 Export 3.17.1 Plate DXF 3.17.2 Panel DXF
ii
33
3.17.3 Shell Expansion
3.18 Invalidation and Regeneration of Plates 3.18
37
3.19 Plate Deletion
38
3.20 Switching Between Autoship and Auto plate
38
3.21 References
38
Chapter 4 - Tutorial
39
4.0 Preliminary Considerations 4.1 Starting 4.1 Starting a New Auto plate Project
40
4.2 Defining Plate Stock
42
4.3 Plate Classification
43
4.4 Setting Up a Baseline
45
4.5 Laying Out Seams and Butts
47
4.6 Defining a Plate
52
4.7 Defining Templates
59
4.8 Defining Pin Jig Settings
61
4.9 Defining Plates on the Stern Bulb
62
4.10 Defining Plates on the Bow Flare
67
4.11 Defining a Panel and its Pin Jig
71
4.12 DXF Output
73
4.12.1 Plate Drawings 4.12.2 Panel Drawings 4.12.3 Shell Expansion
4.13 Generating Reports
74
iii
Contact Information There are two main ways to contact Autoship Systems Corporation: • Contact our technical support dep department artment for technical technical assistance. • For other inquiries, cont contact act our head office.
Technical Support: Our technical support department is available for direct telephone inquiries on weekdays from 08:00 to 17:00 Pacific Standard Time. You can also fax or email questions at any time: Tel: Fax: Email:
(+1) 604 254 4171 (Extension 104) (+1) 604 254 5171
[email protected]
Contacting Autoship's Head Office: If you would like more information about Autoship Systems Corporation and our products, please do not hesitate to contact us at: Tel: Fax:
(+1) 604 254 4171 (+1) 604 254 5171 Autoship Systems Corporation Suite 1451 - 409 Granville Street Vancouver BC Canada V6C 1T21
Getting Started
Chapter 1 Getting Started 1.0 Introducing Auto pla plate te Auto plate plate is is a tool for creating hull plates for ships. It offers the following features: • auto automates mates m many any of the pr processe ocesses s involve involved d in defini defining ng plate b bounda oundaries ries • perf performs orms pl plate ate exp expansion ansion a and nd prod produces uces for forming ming inf informa ormation tion • gene generates rates temp templates lates and pin jig data data • allow allows s as assignm signment ent of st stock ock ttype ype to p plates lates • pr provi ovides des 2D a and nd 3D DXF out output put • gene generates rates shell expa expansion nsion DXF draw drawings ings • prov provides ides a classif classificatio ication n system for th the e organi organization zation of pla plate te infor informatio mation n • crea creates tes pin jjig ig dat data a for p panels anels m made ade of a adjacen djacentt plate plates s • cal calcul culate ates s plate plate wei weight ghts s and areas areas Auto plate plate is is closely tied to the Autoship Autoship hull hull design program. It accepts Autoship Autoship project files as input and has basically the same main screen, controls and menus. In this manual it is assumed that the reader is familiar with Autoship Autoship and and with the Windows Windows operating operating system. If any terms or features in this manual are unfamiliar,, please consult the Auto unfamiliar Autoship ship manual. manual. The system incorporates security features which are designed to prevent accidental modification of a ship design and the plating of trimmed-away portions of surfaces. Auto plate plate reads reads but does not modify Autoship Autoship project project files; the Autoship Auto ship operator operator designates what objects are to be plated.
1
Chapter 1
1.1 System Requirements Auto plate plate is is a 32 bit Windows Windows program.The program.The following table shows minimum system requirements for running the program: Operating System
Windows® 2000 Sp4 Windows XP Windows XP Professional Sp2 or later Windows Vista® Business, Enterprise, or Ultimate Windows Server Windows Server 2003
Processor
Pentium®
Memory
256 MB
Video
1024 X 768 with True Color* A video card with 8MB or more of memory and hardware acceleration for OpenGL is recommended.
Hard Disk
100 MB Free
* Operation is possible at 256 colors, but for rendering to function correctly 32k colors or more are needed.
1.2 Installing Auto pla plate te 1. Place Place th the e CD in yo your ur c comp ompute uterr. 2. matically; In most ca cases an "au "autoru torun" n"access feat feature urethe willdisk st start artvia theeither in install stallation ation pr progra ogram m autoifses it doesn't, then Windows Explorer or or the Start/Run Start/Run commands, and double-click the the Setup32.exe Setup32.exe file. file. 3. A scree screen n will ope open, n, listin listing g all the applicati applications ons avai available lable on tthe he disk an and d the ASC Program authorization. Click th the e application you want to install. install. Note that if you do not have a hardware lock pertaining to that application, you will only be able to run the software in demo mode.
2
Getting Started
1.2.1 ASC Program Authorizati Authorization on 4. If you have n not ot prev previously iously ru run n the ASC Pr Progra ogram m Autho Authorizati rization on from tthis his CD you will have to do so before the application will run with full feature. The programs in the ASC CAD/CAM suite use an authorization system with a hardware lock. A hardware lock is a small electronic device that attaches either to the parallel or USB port of your computer. You need the hardware lock in order for Auto plate plate to to run in normal mode. Otherwise, the program will run only in demo mode. Keep the lock in a safe place when not in use. As outlined in the Licensing Agreement, you are exclusively respon responsible sible for the ha hardware rdware lock. Y You ou ma may y be required to purchase an additional software license if the hardware lock is lost or stolen. An Authorization setup tailored for your installation was provided with your shipment. You may also obtain the latest Authorization setup by contacting Autoship Technical Support. The Authorization setup will install the following components: - the ASC authorization system files - a Lock Settings utility application to allow you to configure the lock - the lock drivers. Before beginning the installation: - remove the lock from the computer, - close all running applications. 5. Accept the defau default lt in install stallation ation locat location, ion, or c click lick Change to specify another location. Importa Impor tant nt Note: You You must remove your USB lock key from the computer before continuing with the installation 6. Follo Follow w the re remaini maining ng instructi instructions ons to co complet mplete e the in install stallation ation..
3
Chapter 1
plate te Setup Program 1.2.2 Auto pla 7. Whe hen n th the e Aut uto o plate plate Setup Setup program starts an information message will appear first. Ensure all other Windows Windows programs programs are closed, and click Next . 8. Accep Acceptt th the e de default fault installatio installation n location location,, or click Change to specify another location. 9.Follow the remaining instructions to complete the installation 1.2.3 Lock Settings After installing the Authorization, Authorization, you may wish to configure configure the lock using the Lock Settings utility. utility. The Lock Settings utility is installed with the authorization system, you will find a shortcut to it on the St Start art Menu. Y You ou are not required to make any changes to the settings, but if you want to optimize the time required for the application to find your lock l ock key, key, it is recommended that you enter the following values: - On the Servers Servers tab, tab, enter the name of the computer on which the lock is attached next to each of the applications you have purchased. - On the Lock Search Order tab, tab, move the type of lock you have purchased over to the Selected list. list. Note that these settings hardwire where the lock system finds the lock, if the lock moves to another computer these settings must be updated. If you clear the settings the lock system attempts to find the lock key by searching all computers.
1.3 Starting and Exiting Auto pla plate te 1.3.1 Starting Click Autoship Autoship/Auto /Auto plate plate start start menu. The Auto plate plate splash splash screen will appear. After the program has finished loading the main screen will appear. 1.3.2 Exiting There are two ways to exit Auto plate plate::
4
Getting Started
1. Using the File menu: Select the Exit option from the File menu. You will be prompted to save your current work. 2. Using the Windows Windows close close box: Double-click the close box at the top left of the main screen. You will be prompted to save your current work.
plate te 9 Navigator 1.3.3 The Auto pla Many Auto plate plate operations operations are accessible through the Auto plate Naviga Navigator. tor. Y You ou many find tis approach approach more e easy asy and direct than using items in the Au Auto to plate menu. (See the online documentation.)
1.4 Online Help Online help is available through the main menu Help item, via Help buttons in individual dialogues and by clicking click ing the F1 button with the mouse over some feature of the user interface. Under the Help menu item there there are three submen submenu u items which access Auto Autoship ship help, Auto plate help and the Auto plate plate about about dialogue. Autoship Autoship help help documents elements of the user interface and functionality which are common to the two programs. Explanation of matters pertaining only to Auto plate plate is is confined to the help system of that name. Clicking on a Help button in any of the Auto plate plate-specific -specific dialogues will bring up Auto plate plate help help opened to the topic for that dialogue.
5
Chapter 1
6
Quick Overview
Chapter 2 Quick Overview This chapter provides a quick, step-by-step approach to producing plates. The numbers in parenthesis indicate later sections of the manual which provide detailed information. At the highest level, the plate production production process can be summarized summarized as follows: Steps to Create and Expand a Plate: 1. The surfaces to be plated are created in Autoship Autoship and and the project is saved as a PR3 file. 2. Curves are created on the surfaces either in Auto Autoship ship or or Auto plate plate.. 3. In Auto plate plate,, curves meant to be the seams (boundaries) of a plate are highlighted and the plate is created c reated by clicking between them on the surface. 4. The plate is expanded and other output data are generated. In more detail: 1. In Autoship ship,, prepare the project for plating (3.4): • Ensur Ensure e that all obje objects cts (sur (surfaces faces and po polyobje lyobjects) cts) to be pla plated ted have the their ir normal vectors pointing outward. • Gath Gather er the these se obj objects ects iinto nto o one ne or more group groups. s. • Optio Optionally nally est establish ablish a ba baseline seline c conta ontaining ining fr frame ame loca locations tions.. • Sa Save ve th the e PR PR3 3 ffilile. e. 2. In Auto plate plate,, start a new plating project (3.5): • Start Aut uto o plate plate,, select F ile - New and and select the PR3 file.
late te - G roup to select the group to be plated. • Use P la Fille - S ave As to create the new PLA file in the desired directory. • Use Fi 7
Chapter 2 3. Optio Optionally nally de define fine ava available ilable st stock ock and se sett up a classif classificatio ication. n. If you lea leave ve out this step, plates will be assigned a default stock, which may be changed later. later.
late - S tock to • Use P late to bring up the Stock dialogue (3.6). • Edit exi existing sting st stocks ocks or a add dd new on ones es to corr correspon espond d to the sto stock ck avail available able for plate production. latte - C las las s ific ation to bring up the Plate Classification • Use P la dialogue (3.7). • Modif Modify y the examp example le in the tuto tutorial rial (4 (4.3) .3) to set up yo your ur desir desired ed plat plate e class system. 4. Lay out the Pla Plate te Bou Bounda ndarie ries: s: • Plate bou boundari ndaries es are embe embedded dded and pr projecte ojected d curves curves,, chines or surf surface/ ace/ polyobject edges (3.8.1). • Cli lic ck the S how P la (3.2.2). late te G r oup button • In crea create te mode, c create reate tthe he curve curves s which ar are e neede needed d to form pl plate ate boundaries (3.8.2). 5. Crea Create te pla plates, tes, on one e at a time ((3.9): 3.9): • In select m mode, ode, sel select ect thos those e curves w which hich for form m the boun boundary dary of on one e plate. • Switc Switch h to creat create e mode and click the creat create e plate icon
.
• Accep Acceptt the na name me pro provided vided b by y the pro program gram o orr ente enterr a new o one. ne. • If plate plates s are to be ge generat nerated ed with th the e same pr proper operties ties at the sa same me location on both port and starboard, check the Twin acr acros os s centre pla plane box. If the plate should be bounded by a chine, check the Chines as boundaries box. If you have set up a classification, select the desired leaf node in the Class tree. • Click OK OK to to close the dialogue. • Move th the e mouse po pointer inter to lilie e over any p point oint on th the e interi interior or of the pla plate te and left click.
8
Quick Overview
6. Once a plate is created, you can view its pr properties operties at any time:
late te - Sel S elect ect to late S elect dialogue (3.10). • Use P la to bring up the P late • Se Sele lect ct jjus ustt one one pl plat ate. e. • Use P late late - View Vi ew t o bring up the P la late te Viewer dialogue (3.11). 7. Exp Expand and pl plate ates s (3.12): (3.12):
late te Sel S elect ect dialogue • In the P la dialogue choose one or more plates to be expanded with the same set of options. late te - E x pand pand to • Use P la to bring up the Expand dialogue. dialogue. • Select the opt options: ions: Dire Directiona ctionality lity (3.12 (3.12.1), .1), Cond Condition ition (3.1 (3.12.2) 2.2),, Extra Stock (3.12.3) and Mesh Edge Tolerance (3.12.4). • Click OK OK.. As each selected plate is being expanded, its name is displayed in the bottom left corner of the dialogue. 8. Create templates and/or pin jigs. These are optional aids to plate fabrication: fabrication: • In the Plate Select dialogue choose one or more plates.
Platte - Pin J ig (3.14) to bring up • Use Plate - Templates (3.13) or Pla the relevant dialogue. • Cho Choose ose opt option ions sa and nd click click OK OK.. • The pro program gram ca calculat lculates es templ templates/ji ates/jigs gs for all selec selected ted plat plates es using the same options. 9. Crea Create te DXF o output utput files ((3.17) 3.17):: • Select the plate( plate(s) s) y you ou w want ant to o output utput..
late te DXF to bring up the Pla P late te Output to D XF • Use F ile - E x port - P la dialogue (3.17.1). • Check th the e boxes for e each ach item y you ou want in included cluded iin n the DXF dr drawing awing.. 2D and 3D are output to separate files for each selected plate. • Each item is on a separate layer layer.. T To o set a layer colour colour,, click the box to left of its check box. Clickclick the desired colour in the colour dialogue. • Ch Choo oose se o out utpu putt un unit its. s.
9
Chapter 2 10. Create shell expansion (3.17.3): • If you wi wish sh to hav have e any pla plates tes sho shown wn on tthe he dra drawing, wing, s select elect tthem. hem.
Fille - E xport - S hel hell Ex pans pans ion to bring up the S hell E x pans io ion n • Use Fi DXF dialogue. • Sel Select ect iitem tems s and se sett colo colours urs a as s abo above. ve. • If you wish tthe he draw drawing ing to be pr produce oduced d to some to toleran lerance, ce, chec check k the D o Refinement box box and enter a value for the tolerance. 11. Create and output panels (3.16). If plates are to be assembled into panels Auto plate will produce data for setting up a pin jig to position them:
Dialog ue (3.16.1). • Use P anel - New to to bring up the New P anel Dialog • Accept the d defaul efaultt name name or enter a new one.
lates tes list select those to be in the new panel. • In the A ll P la • Click A dd Selected. S elected. • In the cas case e that som some e plate is in include cluded d which sh should ould not be be,, select it in th the e emove SSel electe ected d . In Panel list and click R emove • Optio Optionally nally,, en enter ter a co comment mment.. Cli Click ck OK OK..
elect ect to • Hav Having ing cre create ated d a pane panel, l, us use e P anel - S el to bring up a dialogue where it may be selected (3.16.2). nel - Pin J ig to bring up the Pan Pane el Pi n J ig dialogue (3.16.3). • Use P anel • Select the a appro ppropriat priate e options options a and nd us use e the A lig n controls to adjust the jig pin locations to the panel. Click OK OK..
File le - E xport - Pane Panel to bring up the • Sel Select ect p pane anels ls fo forr exp export ort a and nd se selec lectt Fi P anel D XF dialogue. dialogue. Choose options (3.17.2) and click OK OK..
10
Reference
Chapter 3 Reference 3.0 What is Plate Expansion? When a surface has compound curvature (nonzero Gaussian curvature) and flat material is to be made to conform to a patch of that surface, the material must be stretched or shrunk. The resulting relative change in distance between neighbouring points is called strain. The process of calculating the required strain is called expansion, and performing this calculation is one of Auto plate plate's 's principal functions. Note that if the surface patch is developable, the strain will be zero over that patch. Once strain has been calculated, the program can map plate boundaries and internal features, such as embedded curves, from the curved surface onto the flat. This process closely resembles geographical mapping in which a flat representation of the doubly-curved earth's surface is generated. As everyone knows, there are many such mappings: Mercator's, polar stereographic, Cassini, etc. The distinction among these is not that any one is more correct than another another,, but that one may be particularly useful for a given purpose. For example, Mercator's is useful for mapping the whole globe without any cuts except at the poles while the equal-area mappings are useful for seeing relative land area. For any one hull plate many strain distributions are possible. This is reflected in the industry where each commercial program uses a different method (Lamb, 1994), some of which are computer implementations of old manual methods. As in geographical mapping, there is no one correct method. The choice is based on degree of usefulness for plate fabrication. The method selected should also be fast enough to expand many plates in a reasonable time, and capable of correctly completing its calculations for almost any input shape. Auto plate plate,, which was designed with these objectives in mind, uses a new new,, reasonably fast algorithm which produces very smooth mappings. The resulting strain is well distributed over the plate and will result in easy manufacture. 11
Chapter 3
3.1 Overview Overview
Auto plate plate accepts accepts surface shape information only in the form of Autoship Autoship PR3 PR3 files. Plate boundaries (seams and butts) are curves which are embedded in or projected onto Autoship Autoship surfaces. surfaces. These curves may be created either in Auto Autoship ship or Autoplate, or both. Auto plate plate does does not modify PR3 files; it has its own binary file type (extension PLA) in which it can save, among other entities, points and curves added to the project contained in the PR3 file. Having suitably prepared a project in Autoship Auto ship,, you read it into Auto plate plate,, set up a classification tree (if desired) and assign stock to the classes. You are then ready to create any boundary curves which are not already in the project and then to define plates. Curve generation proceeds exactly as in Autoship Auto ship.. A plate is defined by selecting those curves curves which form its boundary boundary and then clicking in the plate interior. interior. The program searches for a closed boundary path, formed from sections of the selected curves and surface/polyobject edges. If such a path is found, a triangular mesh is generated over the plate. Having defined and selected a plate you then generate its expansion. This involves choosing among several options and specifying what if any extra stock you want on the plate boundaries. Once the expansion is performed you can use the Autoplate viewer to evaluate the result. Templates, plate pin jig data and panel pin jjig ig data are generated in separate operations. You may choose to export the results in DXF format and/or generate reports for each plate individually and for all plates. A shell expansion view may also be output as DXF.
12
The Autoplate User Interface
3.2 The Auto pla plat t e User Interface The Auto plat e User Interface
The Auto plate plate main main screen is almost identical to that of Autoship Autoship,, however Auto plate plate has has some different main menu items as well as additional buttons on the control bar. Auto plate plate does does not support the creation or editing of surfaces and polyobjects, so the select, edit and create mode tool icons specific to them are absent. The alternative main screen layouts introduced in Autoship Autoship 9 9 are available in Auto plate plate.. 3.2.1 The Menus and Help system Most of the Autoship Autoship menus menus are present in Auto plate plate.. The Files menu has no import item and export is i s limited to plate, panel and shell expansion DXF DXF.. The Edit menu is simpler in Auto plate plate.. Two new top menu items, Plate and Panel, bring up menus unique to Auto plate plate.. The items in these menus will be discussed individually in later sections. Most of the dialogue boxes unique to Auto plate plate contain contain a Help button. Clicking this will bring up a help topic in which the use of the dialogue is described. 3.2.2 New Control Bar Icons
late te G r oup button has no correspondence in Autoship The S how P la Auto ship.. Like other buttons on the bar in it has andcurves down hosted . When button is down, only the tool objects the two platestates, group,up plus any by this these objects, are visible. Auto plate plate searches searches all curves in the project to find any which are embedded in or projected onto surfaces in the group, or surfaces which are the origin for polyobjects in the group. Only curves which are visible will be displayed. Visibility may be set in the attributes dialogue. This button must be in its down state to define plates.
Pla lates tes button The S how P is an addition to the group of "Show" buttons. When it is in the down state plates are drawn on the screen. How a plate iis s shown late tess - S how Names Names menu item. If it is checked, depends on the setting of the P la the plate outline is drawn and the plate name is drawn at the plate centre. The name colour indicates the plate status: green is valid expanded and red is 13
Chapter 3
Nam ames es is not checked, the plates' triangular meshes are anything else. If S how N late te G r oup drawn. Selected plates are drawn in a highlight colour colour.. The S how P la button must be up for plates to show show..
3.3 Points and Curves in Auto pla plate te All of the Autoship Autoship facilities facilities for creating and editing points and curves are available in Auto plate plate.. No object created in Autoship Auto ship can can be edited or deleted in Auto plate plate,, but any new objects are fully editable. There is one change in curve reate C urve dialogue box, creation: on the embedded and projected tabs of the C reat you may specify the host as a polyobject, in addition to curve or surface. This choice is necessary for plate boundary creation. It signifies that the actual host will be the surface from which the polyobject was created. 3.3.1 New Curve Options In order to facilitate plate layout, several new curve creation options have been added to Autoship Autoship and and Auto plate plate.. • Type 2 Projected Curve: The Curve: The Projected tab tab in the new curve dialogue provides the option of Type 1 or Type 2 projected curves. The former is the original, unchanged, Autoship Autoship projected projected curve. Type 2 projected curves differ in that they are derived from a process equivalent to making an extruded surface from the source curve and intersecting it with the host surface. This may produce more than one projected curve and such s uch curves may encircle the host surface. Type 2 curves are embedded and editable. It is strongly recommended that you use Type 2 rather than Type 1 projected curves when designing plate boundaries. Curve: This is a new tab in the new curve dialogue. Given • Geodesic Offset Curve: This a source curve, side and offset distance, the program creates a new curve offset a constant geodesic distance (i.e. measured along the surface) from the source curve. This is useful for laying out plates of constant, given, width. Note that if the plate forming involves shrinking, the starting width of the plate on flat stock may be larger than the specified offset distance. The resulting curve is embedded and editable. row/col: This curve may now be either embedded or • Curve from surface row/col: This free. This facilitates the placement of plate boundaries on knuckle lines.
14
Preparing an Autoship Project for Autoplate
• Curve Match: When Match: When the source curve is embedded (including planarembedded and geodesic offset) in or projected onto a surface, the match curve may be specified as embedded. If a Type 1 projected curve does not meet a surface edge or has some extraneous shape, you can match it with an embedded curve and edit the latter to the desired shape. PreparinganAuto ship Project for Auto plate
3.4 Preparing an Auto s hi hip p Project for Auto pla plate te The surfaces and polyobjects to be plated must be incorporated into one or more groups in Autoship Autoship.. Although you may create some or all of the plate boundary curves in Autoship Autoship,, there is no need to include these in the group. Polyobjects which were imported or generated as text or primitives cannot be plated. If a polyobject is to be plated, the surface from which it was generated must still be present in the project and must not have been changed since the polyobject was created. This surface should not be included explicitly explici tly in the plating group. All surfaces in the group should have their normal vectors point pointing ing outward. The same is true of the surfaces from which polyobjects are derived. In fact, the latter should be correctly oriented before generating the polyobject. The full generality of Autoship Autoship groups groups is available for this purpose, including cloning and transforms. You may create more than one group to be plated, however, objects to be plated should exist only in one group. In Auto plate plate each each group is handled separately; there is no facility for making a plate cross group boundaries.
etting s - Prefere Preferences nces - B as el eline) ine) in You may establish frame locations (S ett Autoship Auto ship or or Auto plate plate.. If a baseline is defined in Autoship Autoship,, it cannot be changed in Auto plate plate..
15
Chapter 3
3.5 Starting a New Auto pla plate te Project The F ile - New menu menu item in Auto plate plate brings brings up a dialogue for choosing an Autoship Auto PR3 file. There is no way to do any work in Auto plate until a PR3 file has ship PR3 plate until been loaded. When you save an Auto plate plate (PLA) (PLA) file, it contains a reference to the originating PR3 file. The latter file must be available to Auto plate plate every every time the plate project is loaded. If it is not in its original path you will be prompted to enter a location for it. Once an Autoship Autoship project project is loaded, you must indicate which group is to be plated. late - G roup menu item, which brings up a dialogue This is done through the P lat with a list of all groups in the project. When you have chosen a group from this list, the operations of defining and expanding plates may begin. The next two sections describe Auto plate plate's 's facilities for specifying stock and setting up a classification tree. Both of these are optional. You You can define and expand plates using the default stock and root classification. At a later time you can set up a classification and change stock assignments. However, because the expansion calculations depend on plate thickness, changing the stock assigned to a plate invalidates its expansion. For this reason it is advisable to enter the various stock materials before calculating any expansions.
16
Stock
Stock
3.6 Stock Auto plate plate maintains maintains a library of stock material. This is accessible through the menualready item. The dialogue dialogue allows you to view the P late late - Sto S tock ckstock P la late S tock properties of in the lite library brary and to add new stock.
Stock has a name, material, specific gravity gravity,, thickness, length and width. Other properties, such as grade of material, may be incorporated into the name. To create a new stock specification, start by entering its name. Then select a material. If the list of materials does not contain an appropriate entry, entry, create one by entering its name and specific gravity. Enter the desired plate thickness and maximum dimensions, then click S ave. If you wish to delete a stock from the library, you must first ensure that no plate has that stock assigned to it.
17
Chapter 3
3.7 Setting Up a Classification Auto plate plate helps helps you to keep an orderly account of the numerous plates in a project by providing a hierarchical classification system. You set up and change the classification, and edit stock assignment, using the dialogue which is brought late - Cla C lass s menu item. up by the P late
The plate classification scheme is very similar to how multiple, hierarchical, directories are used to organize your computer files. The main difference is that a disk directory may contain files or directories or both, whereas nodes of the Auto plate classification can contain only other nodes or plates, not both. Each node which can contain plates has a stock material assigned to it. This dialogue also allows you to change the classification of any plate. Note that information from the stock is used in the expansion calculation, so changing a plate's class, or changing the stock assigned to its class, requires re-expanding it. For this reason it is advisable to take the time to set up a good classification before commencing plate expansion.
18
Plate Boundaries
Plate Boundaries
3.8 Plate Boundaries 3.8.1 Requirements for Plate Boundaries
Auto plate plate will will create and expand plates of three or more sides. The curves that you select, plus any intersected surface or polyobject edges, plus (optionally) chines, must form a closed boundary having at least three corners. The following count as corners (consider chines to be curves): • Knu Knuckle ckles s on th the e bou bounda ndary ry cu curve rves. s. • Th The e mut mutual ual e end nd point point of of a clos closed ed cu curve rve.. • The po point int wher where e a curve me meets ets a bou boundary ndary o off the surf surface ace or pol polyobje yobject. ct. • The point wher where e two curve curves s cro cross ss or join, and • The po point int whe where re one curve ttermin erminates ates o on n anoth another er cur curve. ve.
Only selected curves will be part of the boundary definition. Any other curves, even if they cross the plate, will not be considered. Auto plate plate will will not create plates which have concave boundaries. A boundary is concave if the polygon made of straight lines l ines joining corners has any edge which, if extended as a straight line, l ine, penetrates the polygon interior interior.. For instance, imagine a four sided polygon where the inside angle between two adjacent legs is more than 180 degrees. Auto plate plate will will handle some boundaries which have concave curved edges between corners. When a curve and surface edge are intended i ntended as plate boundaries, and the curve does not meet the edge, one possible error message is "Boundary Is Concave". If you get this message, and the boundary is not concave in the sense described in the last paragraph, check the ends of relevant curves.
19
Chapter 3 3.8.2 Tips for Creating Plate Boundary Curves
One way to lay out plate boundaries is by making straight space curves and projecting them onto the surface. If you use Type 1 projected curves this does not work well when surface is tangent theprojection projectionoperation directionisanywhere along the curve. Whenthe such tangency exists,tothe not properly defined and the resulting projected curve may be wiggly and may even turn back on itself or may not contact the surface edge. This is likely to happen with a sideprojected curve at the bow or stern. If a projected curve seems to meet a surface edge but you get an error message when trying to create a plate from it, suspect this as a cause.
There are several ways to avoid this problem. 1. Use Type 2 projected curves. 2. Make a planar-embedded curve running over the whole region of interest. Although these curves can be hard hard to edit, this solution is preferred preferred over 3. 3. Project two Type 1 curves in different views. An example is one source curve at constant y and z (horizontal, parallel to the centre plane), projected from the side and another curve at constant x and the same z, projected in body plan. Then the two projected curves together cover the whole region of interest. For any given plate, use the curve which is valid on that part of the surface as a boundary. 4. Once you have one good curve established, create others as geodesic offset curves.
20
Creating a Plate
Creatinga n ga Plate
3.9 Creating a Plate late te 1. Ensure that a plate group has been selected and that the S how P la Group button is down. 2. In select mode, select the curves which will form the plate boundary boundary.. 3. Switch to create mode.
late te button 4. Click the C reate P la
.
5. Click over any point on the desired plate interior.
6. When the new plate dialogue appears enter a name for the plate (or choose the default) and select a class. 7. If the ship is symmetric about a centre plane, you may create plates for both centre plane plane box. sides by checking the Twin acros s centre 8. If you want chines to be considered as boundary curves, check the Chines as boundari boundaries es box. 9. If you are creating a plate w which hich has one edge on the centre plane, plane, you can choose to have port and starboard as one plate. 10. Click OK OK.. 21
Chapter 3
3.10 Plate Selection Pla late tess - S elect elect menu item provides access to the P la late te S elect elect dialogue. The P late tess - View menu Using this you may select one or more plates. The P la menu item is enabled only if just one plate is selected. Several program operations apply to one or more selected plates at once: expansion, template specification, pin jig specification, DXF export, appearance on shell expansion. The list box in this dialogue also provides an indication of the plate state. See the help item and the section "Invalidation and Regeneration of Plates", 3.18 below, for details. You can also select plates in the Auto plate plate Navigator. Navigator.
22
The Plate Viewer
The PlateViewer
3.11 3.1 1 The Plate Viewer lattes - View Vi ew is If one and only one plate is selected, the menu item P la is enabled and selecting it brings up the plate This viewer dialogue. also beabout access from the Auto plate Navigator. plate Navigator. provides youThis withdialogue detailed may i nformation information the selected plate. Please see the Help item for more information.
The dialogue has 3 tabs:
Image
This tab contains several option buttons by which you choose what image to view. Several require that the plate has been expanded, and Templates and Template Layout require that templates have been specified.
Data
This provides several pieces of quantitative information about the plate, although most are available only for expanded plates. Any comments you enter in the text box are saved with the project file and will appear the next time you view the plate's data.
Metricc s Metri
This shows information about plate shape, both graphically and as text. The purpose of this information is to enable you to judge whether a plate is so curved that it should be subdivided. This information is available before and after expansion.
In the viewer, drawings are as seen from the outside of the hull.
23
Chapter 3
3.12 Expansion Expansion
late tess - E xpand xpand menu The P la menu item brings up the Expand dialogue. It is also accessed through the Auto plate plate Navigator. Navigator. After you have made the various choices presented on it, Auto plate plate loops loops over all the selected plates and performs the specified expansion operation.
If any plate already has a valid expansion, you will be prompted with a choice to re-expand or skip that plate. The time required to expand a plate depends on its i ts shape; long, thin plates take more time than short, broad ones. It can take many minutes to expand plates with a very high length to width ratio.
3.12.1 Directionality The first choice, Directionality , will be determined by the fabrication technique which will be used to form the plate. Isotropic (equal in all directions) is appropriate to peening and spherical die pressing. If line heating or roller planishing is to be used, the expansion should be directional. In this case there are three choices of direction. Longitudinal or Transverse might olll Line Li ne causes the be chosen for convenience with some equipment. R ol expansion locally along theroll direction greatest curvature. In of other words, it is to at be right angles to the marks of which indicate direction least 24
Expansion
curvature. This is probably a good choice for line heating, because the operator can use the roll marks to indicate the direction of torch motion. If you choose any of the unidirectional expansions, you must specify a strain ratio. This is the ratio of strain in the direction of least strain to that in the direction of greatest strain. Auto plate plate will will accept values in the interval 0.1 to 1.0. Unidirectional expansion is mathematically different from isotropic. Auto plate plate sometimes has trouble calculating unidirectional expansion with low (near 0.1) strain ratios. The program produces best results when the direction is across roll lines.
3.12.2 Condition Auto plate plate can can generate different expansions, depending on the choice of res erve P erimet erimeter er does just that - the flat and curved plates have condition. P reserve hrii nk On Only ly is equal perimeters. S hr is appropriate if the fabrication method induces xpand Only Only is appropriate for peening, only negative strain (i.e. line heating). E xpand Mini nimum mum S train , is spherical die press and roller planishing. A fourth choice, Mi provided in case both shrinking and expanding equipment can be applied and the goal is to minimize the maximum absolute strain.
3.12.3 Extra Stock Auto plate can can calculate extra stock (green)width on plate boundaries. In the case plate of four-sided platesand yououtput may specify a different for each side. Other plates are limited to having the same width on all sides.
3.12.4 Mesh The mathematical operations of plate expansion require that a triangular mesh be generated over the plate. This becomes the internal representation of the plate, both in-place and flat. In order to have smooth and accurate edges, you may specify an edge tolerance for the mesh. What this means is that the straight line joining any two adjacent vertices vertices on the plate edge will not deviate by more more than the specified distance from the defining curve. Auto plate will subdivide edge plate will 25
Chapter 3 triangles until this condition is satisfied. Choosing a very small tolerance will slow calculations and consume memory memory.. Also, Auto plate plate has has a limit to edge subdivision and if the specified tolerance is not achieved within this limit, an error results, as indicated in the next section.
3.12.5 Expansion Failure The mathematical algorithms involved in the expansion calculation can fail. Unidirectional expansion is more likely to fail than isotropic. Failure will show up as: • • • •
am mes essa sage ge sa sayi ying ng ““Edge Edge Tolerance Not Achieved - No Expansion" Expansion " am mes essa sage ge sa sayi ying ng ""Expansion Expansion Failed " or "Unable "Unable to Find Solution" Solution" a me mess ssag age e sa sayi ying ng "Flat Mesh Generation Failed ", ", or a messa message ge sayin saying g that a lar large ge expa expansion nsion er error ror has b been een det detected ected..
In the first case, try setting the edge tolerance larger and re-attempting the expansion. In the last case, there is a valid expansion, but it may be quite unsatisfactory unsatisfactory.. xpande ded d Mes Mesh h on the Image tab of the Plate viewer you will If you choose E xpan be able to see any errors in the result. Also, choose the Data tab and look at E xpansi xpansi on E rror . In the case of a good result, this number will the value for E be < 0.001. The usual causes of expansion failure are too much plate curvature or very irregular boundaries; usually the best cure is to split the plate into two or more smaller pieces and deal with them separately separately.. Sometimes the program will find a solution at one edge tolerance and not another, so it is worthwhile trying several values of this parameter. The message "Flat "Flat Mesh Generation Failed " usually means that the mesh is degenerate somewhere on the plate. This can be caused by surface edge attachment, by superimposed control points and by some other conditions.
26
Templates
Templates
3.13 Templates lates tes - Templates Templates menu choice opens the Templates dialogue. It is also The P la accessed through the, the Auto plate Navigator plate Navigator. . When you make yourand choice of the options and click OK OK, program loops over all selected plates creates specified templates for each.
Line ne, which is the line formed by the Templates are arranged along a S i g ht Li intersection of the in-place plate and a plane containing the average normal vector of the plate. Choose either to allow Auto plate to determine the sight line orientation (B es t Fit ) or specify that it should be horizontal, vertical or normal to the frames. The latter option is meaningful only if frames locations (baseline) have been specified. Template spacing may be set at a given distance or calculated from the number of templates required for the plate or templates may be located at frames. In the last case you can chose to have templates at the plate ends. ends. Template shapes consist of a base with curved bottom conforming to the in-place plate and an orientation handle with a right angle hook at the top. See the figure in Section 4.7. The handle is positioned such that if the templates are in place on the formed plate, the orientation handles all line up in i n the sight line plane and the hooks line up along one straight line. The frames are not loacated at the ends.
27
Chapter 3
3.14 Pin Jig Pin Jig
The P lates - Pi n J ig menu choice produces the P late Pin J ig dialogue. It is also accessed through Auto plate plate Navigator. Navigator. This allows you to set parameters for creation of pin jig data.
When you click OK OK,, Auto plate cycles through the selected plates and generates pin placement for each. The result for any one plate may be seen in the Plate Viewer, and exported as a DXF layer.
28
Reports
Reports
3.15 Reports Auto plate plate will will generate both per-plate and summary reports. In both cases the included plates the mayname, be those selected or all plates in information the project. and A per-plate report contains class, stock details, metric expansion results. A summary report is arranged by classification, indicating the number of plates, total weight, total area and total CG of plates in each class and for all classes. The report is produced using the Autoship Autoship report report editor, editor, with all the editing and output capabilities of that system.
29
Chapter 3
3.16 Panels Panels
A panel is a group of of contiguous plates which are to be welded together together.. T To o this end, Auto plate plate will will generate the data required to create a pin jig to hold the plates in their correct relation to one another. another. 3.16.1 Creating a New Panel
Selecting menu item will bringfor upthe a dialogue for may creating a new P anel generates - New menu panel. Thethe program a unique name panel. You You change the lates list box name to be more meaningful in the context of your project. The A ll P lates shows the names of all expanded plates existing in the current plating group. Un-expanded Un-expande d plates cannot be placed in a panel. Select the plates you wish to lates tes list. Multiple select is include in the panel by picking their names in the A ll P la supported, with the usual use of shift and control key sequences. To To have the elect ected ed button selected plates included in the panel, click the A dd S el button - the plate names will be displayed in the I n Panel list. You can edit the In P anel selection by lates list, or by selecting plates in the In P anel adding more plates from the A ll P lates list and clicking the Remove Selected button. button.
30
Panels
You may type a comment of arbitrary length into the Comment text text box. This comment will be stored with the panel data and will appear whenever you edit the panel. When selecting the plates to include in a panel, keep in mind that they should be at least partly contiguous. The program makes no attempt to enforce this, or even to prevent you from putting superimposed plates into a panel. In the latter case the program will produce meaningless results.
3.16.2 Selecting Panels The second sub-menu item under Panel is S elect . This brings up a dialogue in which you may select one or more panels. If just one panel is selected, the second (Edit ) and third (Pin J ig ) sub-menu items are enabled. The Edit item brings up the same dialogue as above, with the panel data filled in. You may edit this information, even adding and removing plates, and save the result. Multiple panel select is relevant to export as DXF (see below), where the program will export all selected panels. 3.16.3 Creating a Panel Pin Jig Selecting the Pin J ig menu item brings up a dialogue to specify pin jig layout.
31
Chapter 3 The picture box on the right displays a projected view of the panel with its plate boundaries visible as black lines. If a baseline is defined in the project, frame locations are displayed in cyan. You can choose the units in which the minimum pin height and spacings are displayed. Inms the. These Spacing frame there to selectInbetween Grid ea and On S eams determine the are typeoption of pin buttons layout created. the former Spacing and case, the pins lie on a regular grid, spaced according to the R ow Spacing P i n SS paci pacing ng values. If you select this option, the red lines in the picture box, which represent pin rows, will have small circles drawn at the pin locations. If you eams , the pin location circles are not drawn. Pins will be placed on the select On S eams row lines where they cross plate boundaries. If the span between any two pins pacing value, extra pins will be inserted. exceeds the Pi n S pacing The A lig n controls allow you to place the pins as you wish. The Rotate spin control causes the row lines to rotate around the panel centre. The shift spin controls move the row If the Grid spacing spacing option selected the pin locations are moved uplines. and down by the right shift spiniscontrol. When pin information is generated the layout may be chosen for the pins to be located either on the inside or outside of the hull. This is determined by the setting ide e option. of the S id
32
Export
Export
3.17 Export Export
Auto plate plate will will generate per-plate drawings, per panel drawings and a shell expansion in DXF form. The dialogues for these drawings are accessed by clicking the appropriate sub menu item under File Filess - E xport xport . 3.17.1 Plate DXF When you have made your choice of options, Auto plate plate loops loops over all selected plates and generates, for each plate, a file fil e for 2D output (if chosen) and another file for 3D output (if chosen). The default file names are created by pre-pending the characters "2dPLT_ " or "3dPLT_ " to the plate name. If a file of that name already exists in the destination directory you will be prompted to change the name or overwrite the file.
In both the 2D and 3D cases separate layers are generated for each option chosen. If any other option is chosen, the outline is included by default. If the Templates option is included, the template layout l ayout lines and template shapes are placed on separate layers.
33
Chapter 3 The small boxes to the left of the check boxes are painted in the colour which will be used for the layer. If you click a colour box, a bar containing the available colours will appear. Clicking on one of the colour patches will change the layer colour to the one selected. The viewwith in 2D outputvectors is frompointing the inside of the hull (provided the surface is you oriented normal outward). If, when you created the plate chose Twin across center plane, drawings will be produced for the plates on both sides of the hull. If Curves is chosen (either 2D or 3D), the program draws all curves which are embedded or projected on the surface patch covered by the plate. If the Offsets option is chosen, the program draws x and y Cartesian axes and shows the coordinates of points with respect to these axes. Strain Strain contours and thickness contours may be used to guide fabrication. The formerthe indicates thebe magnitude of strainthe to fabrication be inducedprocess. at each point on the plate while latter can used to monitor The 3D output represents the in-place plate. Choosing Mes h in the 3D output produces a PFACE entity representation. The units options allow you to choose the units in which the drawings are produced.
34
Export
3.17.2 Panel DXF Having assigned plates to a panel ( P anel - New menu item) and defined the Pane el - Pin J ig menu item), you can export the layout of a pin jig for the panel (Pan resulting layout to a DXF file. The program loops over all selected panels (P anel - S el menu item) and produces one file per panel. The file name is elect ect menu composed of the panel name appended to "Panel_". Colour choices for layers are selected as described in the previous section.
35
Chapter 3 3.17.3 Shell Expansi Expansion on
Making a choice of options and clicking OK OK will will result in generation of a DXF file containing a shell expansion of the current plate project. If no option is chosen, only expansion outline will be produced. A separate layer will be created for eachthe option.
The program will optionally refine each surface and curve to a specified tolerance before performing the expansion calculations, which are based on table values. The colour patches to the left of each check box indicate the colour which will be used for that layer. You can change any colour by clicking on the patch and choosing a colour from the palette presented.
36
Invalidation and Regeneration of Plates
Invalidationand Regenerationo f Plates
3.18 Invalidation and Regeneration of Plates At any time, each plate is in one of four states: invalid un-expanded un-expanded (iu), valid un un-expanded (vu), invalid expanded (ie) or valid expanded (ve). A valid plate can be marked invalid for several reasons: • It Its s clas classif sifica icatio tion n has been been cha change nged, d, • The sur surface face on wh which ich the pla plate te lies, or tthe he surf surface ace used tto o gener generate ate the polyobject on which the plate lies, has been modified since the plate was expanded, • Any of tthe he boun bounding ding cu curves rves ha has s been m modifi odified ed since tthe he plat plate e was expanded.
Checks for the last two situations are performed every time a project is loaded. If any plate is found to be invalid at this time, a message is displayed saying that at least one plate is invalid. A check for invalidation is also performed each time a curve is edited in Auto plate plate.. You can determine what state a plate is in by bringing up the plate selection dialogue and selecting the class for the desired plate. The first two columns in the list box contain "iu", "vu", "ie" or "ve". Selecting the Regenerate menu item causes Auto plate plate to to loop over all plates in the project, performing regeneration on any which has an invalid expansion. If the plate has never been expanded, its boundary and mesh only are regenerated. If it has been expanded, the expansion is recalculated, using the original expansion parameters. If any boundary curve defining a plate or the surface or polyobject on which the plate resides has been deleted from the PR3 or PLA file, that plate will also be deleted.
37
Chapter 3
3.19 Plate Deletion You may delete one or more plates by selecting them and then choosing Delete from the Edit menu or by pressing the Delete key. Delete works only in select mode.
3.20 Switching Between Auto s hip hi p and Auto pla plate te It is possible to run these programs simultaneously simultaneously.. Before switching from Auto plate plate to to Autoship Autoship,, save the plate project. To switch from Autoship Auto ship to to Auto plate plate,, save the Autoship Autoship project, project, then reload the Auto plate plate project; project; it will read in the new version of the PR3 file. Beware of making changes to the Autoship Auto ship project project which affect the plate project. Editing curves, surfaces and polyobjects which are used in Auto plate plate may invalidate plates. Any invalid plates should be regenerated. Deleting any such object will cause the dependent plates to be deleted when regeneration is performed.
3.21 References Lamb, Thomas. 1994. "Report "Report on Limitations of Computerized Lofting for Shell Plate Development", Development", The Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, Ship Production Committee.
38
Tutorial
Chapter 4 Tutorial 4.0 Preliminary Considerations In order to produce an expansion of a surface patch, Auto plate plate requires requires a surface definition. Auto plate plate does does not have the capability to produce a surface definition and relies on input from Autoship Auto ship.. The form of this input is an Autoship Auto ship project project file. Auto plate plate uses uses this file, but to ensure data integrity integrity,, does not make changes to it. Instead, Auto plate plate stores stores its information in a file having the PLA. Hence plate project plate projectthe consists of twoPR3 files:file. the PR3 andextension the PLA; the PLA file isan ofAuto no use without appropriate The definition produced in Autoship Autoship consists consists of various curves, surfaces and polyobjects. Auto plate plate requires requires that the entities (surfaces and polyobjects) defining the region to be plated be collected together in a Group. For each polyobject to be used in a plating group the original surface must exist in the Autoship Auto ship project. project. Since there is no facility in Auto plate plate for for creating a surface or polyobject; the surface definition must be completed in Autoship Auto ship before before turning to Auto plate plate.. Operation of Auto plate plate consists consists of laying out curves on the surface of the model, choosing appropriate curves as plate boundaries and then having Auto plate plate create and expand a plate over the enclosed area. The intent of this tutorial is to guide you through the entire process of starting a new Auto plate plate project project (using an Autoship Autoship project project supplied with the Auto plate plate installation) and producing the information to cut and form the various type of shell plates usually encountered in a ship constructed of metal. Additionally, Additionally, insight into the tools which help the operator optimize plate production is provided. It is assumed that you have a basic understanding of the principles, operation and building blocks of the Auto s hip hi p program.
39
Chapter 4
4.1 Starting a New Auto pla plate te Project Startinga New Auto plate Project
When Auto plate plate was was installed on your system, a tutorial folder was created and a file named APTUT APTUT.PR3 .PR3 was copied to it. This model is composed of several curves, six surfaces, four polyobjects and two groups.
The group "Aft Plating Group" consists of: • polyob polyobject ject Trimme rimmed dH Hull ull Aft Lowe Lower r • polyob polyobject ject Trimmed Trimmed Stern Bulb • su surf rfac ace e Hull Hull Af Aftt Up Uppe per r
The group "Fwd Plating Group" consists of: • polyob polyobject ject Trimme rimmed dH Hull ull Fwd Lowe Lowerr • pol polyob yobjec jectt T Trim rimmed med Fwd Fwd B Bulb ulb • su surf rfac ace e Hull Hull F Fwd wd U Upp pper er These are the surface definitions we will be using.
We suggest that a separate directory be created for each new vessel, or portion of a vessel to be plated and all the work for that project be stored in that directory. For the purposes of this tutorial, we will use the TUTOR TUTORIAL IAL directory. directory. The TUTO TUTORIAL RIAL directory bedepends found in on theyour public documents special folder, the exact location of this can folder operating system: In Window XP or or Windows 2000 : Documents and Settings\All Users\Shared Documents\ASC\Auto Documents\ASC\Autoplate\Tu plate\Tutorials torials In Windows Vista: Vista: Users\Public\Public Documents\ASC\Autoplate\T Documents\ASC\Autoplate\Tutorials utorials The first operation necessary to start a new plating project is to bring the Autoship Autoship project into Auto plate plate.. After you have started Auto plate plate,, select the File - New menu item to begin a new project. The Open Auto Autoship ship Project Project File dialogue will appear.. This is where you indicate which Auto appear Autoship ship project project you will be using for your Auto plate plate project. project. Pick the file APTUT.PR3 found in the TUTORIAL directory.
40
Starting a New Autoplate Project
After the project is loaded, loaded, the Auto plate plate screen screen will probably be blank. This is because, by default, nothing has been selected to be shown. In the top bar, click the Groups
button to show the groups in the project.
Notice that the button changes state. Now you should see the outline of the tutorial model on screen. If your screen is not showing all four views, click the
Four View Vi ew
ettii ng s button at the bottom of the screen. Select the S ett Coordina oordinate te S ys tem button in menu and pick the Preferences item, click the C Naval//A ir cr aft US radio button. Click the Preferences dialogue and select the Naval oordinate te S ys te tem m dialogue, and then OK OK to OK to exit the C oordina OK to to exit the Preferences dialogue. Next, we have to indicate to Auto plate plate which which portion of the hull, or group, we will be working with.
Grr oup For F or P la lating ting Click the Plate menu and pick the Group item. In the S elect G Plating G roup and Click OK dialogue that opens, pick Fwd Plat OK.. Now to visualize the portion we wish to work on and enable Auto plate plate to to deal with
late G r oup it, click the S how P late button in the top toolbar toolbar.. Notice that the button changes state. On the screen, you will see that now only the forward half of the vessel is shown. When the S how P late late G r oup button is on, only the surfaces and polyobjects in the plating group, plus any curves that are embedded or projected onto these objects in the plating group, will be visible.
41
Chapter 4
4.2 Defining Plate Stock late te Stock As part of the setup for for a new project, we need need to define P la - the raw sheet material we will be using to construct the shell plating. For this example, we will create four different stock specifications: • • • •
100 1000mm 0mm x 150 1500mm 0mm x 100 1000mm 0mm x 150 1500mm 0mm x
20 2000m 00mm m 60 6000m 00mm m 20 2000m 00mm m 60 6000m 00mm m
in 8mm pla plate te in 8mm pla plate te in 10mm 10mm pla plate te in 10mm 10mm pla plate te
Click the Plate menu and the S tock item.
late Stock dialogue Fill out the P late dialogue as follows and then click S ave.
Answer Y es to the prompt "Do you want to add …" . Add . Add three more entries entries the same way: Name
Thickness
Material
Max Dimensions Length
Width
1500x6000x8
mm
8
Steel
m
6.00
1.50
1000x2000x10
mm
10
Steel
m
2.00
1.00
1500x6000x10
mm
10
Steel
m
6.00
1.50
Remember to click S ave each time you finish an entry entry.. When you are done, click Exit . 42
Plate Classification
Plate Classification
4.3 Plate Classification late C las las s ific ation system. Next, we will set up a P lat P la late te Clas Clas s ifica ific ation is a categorization scheme intended i ntended to help the designer organize the various plates into meaningful groups. The architecture of the organization is entirely open - it may be laid out in any manner that suits the purpose. For instance, you could choose to categorize your plates based upon supplier or the region of the hull to be plated or the date of forming. Creating a P late late C la lass s scheme is not required but can be very useful. Click the Plate menu and the Class item to bring up the Plate Classification dialogue. This is divided into two sections: the left half is used to define the classification tree; the right half is used to control where plates fit into the classification tree.
latte C las las s ific ation dialogue, under Class Tree, Fwd Pl P lating G roup In the P la will appear highlighted. This is the entire tree structure of the classification system so far. We want to add some branches and leaves to the existing tree. Suppose for our vessel that we have two different shops, Shop A and Shop B, available to cut and form our plates. Further Further,, the two shops have different forming capabilities, and Shop B can only handle the smaller stock.
Plating group selected, click the New Level L evel button. This will add With Fwd Plat another category below the F Fwd wd Pla P lating ting group. A dialogue with Class1 highlighted will appear, appear, change Class1 to Shop A and Click OK OK.. Now our tree Plating group with a sub-category named Shop A. consists of Fwd Plating Let's add some leaves, 8mm and 10mm, under Shop A. With Shop A selected, L evel button again. Change Class2 into 8mm click the New Level 8mm.. Now create category 10mm at the same level as 8mm: with 8mm 8mm selected selected click A t L evel button. Change Class3 into 10mm the A dd At 10mm.. Now we want to add Shop B, also with 8mm and 10mm: With Shop A selected, click the A dd At A t L evel button and change Class2 into Shop B.
43
Chapter 4 With Shop B selected, click New Level, change Class2 to 8mm 8mm.. With 8mm 8mm A t L evel and change Class3 to 10mm selected, click A dd At 10mm.. Further,, for this example, we want to associate a particular class with a Further particular type of stock. Since Shop B can only work with the smaller stock, lets associate the 1000mm x 2000mm plates with Shop B: Click the 8mm category under Shop B and then in the S tock box, pick 1000x2000x8.. Answer Y es to the "Are you sure …" prompt. 1000x2000x8 prompt. Then, still for Shop B, click the 10mm 10mm category category and for Stock, pick 1000x2000x10. Now,, do the same for Shop A using the 1500x6000 stock sizes. Now Later, when we are defining plates, they may be assigned to any of the terminal Later, categories, or leaves. Click Exit Exit when when you are done creating your classification cl assification system.
44
Setting Up a Baseline
SettingUp a Baseline ne
4.4 Setting Up a Baseline In order to help us lay l ay out butts to be offset from frames, we can utilize a function ininAuto plate which plate which frame locations. Thewill same functionthrough is available Auto Autoship ship and, and, ifdefines used there, the information be passed to Auto plate plate..
ettii ng s menu and pick the Preferences item and in the Preferences Click the S ett dialogue, click the Baseline button. For the vessel we are using in this tutorial, the aft extent is at L = 2.5A (A for Aft of the origin) and the forward extent is at L = 137.5F (F for Forward of the origin). The AP is at 4F, the FP is at 130F. Suppose we want the following frame spacing: • 800mm for aft of the AP • 700mm from the AP to the F FP P (or as close as possible) • 800mm ahead of th that at
Location enter 2.5A; for Last In the Baseline dialogue, under G roup for Fir s t Locat Location enter 4F, for S eparation enter .8 and then click the Ins ert G roup button. In the Frame box, note that frame 9 is at 4.0F while frame 8 is at 3.9F 3.9F.. Since we want a frame to coincide with the AP at 4.0F 4.0F,, we need to move the Firs rs t Locat Location to 2.4A, Las t Location Location to 4F frames forward by .1m: change Fi roup. and click the Ins ert G roup Note that now frame 1 is at 2.5A and frame 2 is at 2.4A. We don't need the frame at 2.5A, so in the Frame box, click the F rame 1 line and then click the Delete button.
Fi rs t Fram Frame Suppose we wanted frame 0 to be located at the AP: In the Firs Number box, box, type -8 and click the A pply button. button. In the Frame box, the frame numbers are now re-organized to match the new input. Location, type 4F, for Last Continuing with the other two sets: For F irs t Location Location type 130F, for S eparat eparatii on type .7 and click Ins ert G rou roup p. If you scroll to the bottom of the Frame list, you will see that frame 180 is at 130F.
45
Chapter 4
Firs rs t Locat Location, type 130F, for La L as t Locat Location ion type 138F, for The final set: For Fi S eparation type .8 and click Ins ert G roup roup. Now scroll to the bottom of the frame list, the last frame is at 138F and the second to last is at 137.2F 137.2F.. We don't need the frame at 138F, so delete it. Click OK OK to to to the Preferences dialogue. the checkbox beside Display Baseline is return not checked, do so now. Click OK to OK toIfreturn to the main screen. The baseline should show in the plan and profile views. Now we have finished with the setup necessary for a new project. Before we carry on to produce some plates, save this Auto plate plate project. project.
46
Laying Out Seams and Butts
Laying Out Seams andButts
4.5 Laying Out Seams and Butts Laying Out Seams andButts
As a first example, we w will ill lay out some some plates forwa forward rd of midship midships s on the b bottom ottom of the hull. Suppose that in i n the forward part of the vessel the butts are to be 100mm forward of frame locations. Working forward from midships, we expect to be able to use the larger of the plate stock we have defined. Midships is at 55F 55F,, the large plates are 6m, so we need a butt at around 100mm forward of the frame just aft of 61F. 61F. The baseline definition show shows s frame 81at 60.7F; let let's 's position a butt at 60.8F. Expecting that butts will be staggered between adjacent strakes, we need to position a butt somewhere between 55F and 60.8F 60.8F.. From the Frame List, frame 77 is at 57.9F, so let's put a butt at 58F. Then, 6m fwd of 58F is 64F and frame 85 is at 63.5F, so our next butt will be at 63.6F. To define plate boundaries, i.e. a butt, we need to use either an embedded or a projected curve. An easy way to define each of these three butts is to create a simple straight curve running transversely and then project it up onto the hull to produce a projected curve in the correct location. reate Cur ve Click the Create button and then the Curve button. In the C reat dialogue, with the Free tab selected, complete the dialogue as follows.
47
Chapter 4 Click OK OK when when you are done. reate - Curve C urve; this time, select the Projected Then we can create the butt: Click C reate tab, enter the following data and Click OK OK when when you are done. Name
Butt 1F
Tab
Projected
Type
Type 2
Projection
Top
Source Curves
Butt 1F Template
Host
PolyObject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower
Acceptable Tolerance Tolerance
.001
You may find it easier to visualize these curves if you turn off the baseline: S etting s - Pr P r eferenc efer ences es - Dis Di s play play B aselin as eline e checkbox.
We will create Butt 2F at L = 60.8F in the same manner.
The template curve: click Create then the Curve button and input the following:
48
Name
Butt 2F template
Tab
Free
Control Pts
2Free
End 1
L = 60.8F
End 2
L = 60.8F T = 13
Laying Out Seams and Butts
The Butt Curve:
reate - Curve C urve and input the following: Click C reate Name
Butt 2F
Tab Type
Projected Type 2
Projection
Top
Source Curve
Butt 2F template
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower
Acceptable Tolerance Tolerance
.001
Create Butt 3F at L = 63.5F the same way: The Template Curve: Name
Butt 3F template
Tab
Free
Control Pts
2
End 1
L = 63.5F
End 2
L = 63.5F T = 13
The Butt Curve: Name
Butt 3F
Tab
Projected
Type
Type 2
Projection
Top.
Source Curve
Butt 3F template
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower
Acceptable Tolerance Tolerance
.001
49
Chapter 4 Now we have three butts. Of course we would need many more butts to plate the entire hull. However, let's define a few seams so that we can then create some plates. On this vessel, the bottom is i s flat from midships to quite far forward. In this flat region would expect to have seam or near the centerline spacedwe multiples of the width of a the plateatstock outboard of that. and other seams For purposes of this example, we will concentrate on the portion of the hull outboard of the flat-bottom section. In the region of our three butts, let's define a seam at a transverse value of 7.5m (5 x 1.5m plate width). The easiest way to do this is, again, with a projected curve.
Create a New Curve: Name Tab
Seam 5F template Free
Control Pts
2
End 1
L = 55F T = 7.5
End 2
L = 65F T = 7.5
And the Projection: Name
Seam 5F
Tab
Projected
Type
Type 2
Projection
Top
Source Curve
Seam 5F template
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Trimm ed Hull Fwd Lower
Acceptable Tolerance Tolerance
.001
50
Laying Out Seams and Butts
odesic Off Offss et to For the next seam, we can use a special curve type named G eodesic to put another curve at a specific distance, measured along the surface, away from Seam 5. To To ensure that the resulting plate fits onto plate stock of width 1.5m let's make the offset distance 1.45 m. Create another curve, as follows, using the G eo eode dess ic Offs et tab:
51
Chapter 4
4.6 Defining a Plate Defining a Plate
First we must specify the boundaries we wish to use: Click somewhere in the Top view window and then zoom in on an area that includes all the butts and seams you have defined. Make sure that S elect mode mode is Pla late te G r oup button is turned on and that nothing is selected turned on, the S how P ("No Selection" appears in the object box at top right). Select the four curves: Butt 1F, Butt 3F, Seam 5f and Seam 6F. Refer to the following picture if you are unsure of the identity of the curves. c urves. T To o select multiple curves, click theclickclick curve, hold down the SHIFT key and click each of the other curves. Now to create the plate: Click the Create button, then on the Plate button, and then click somewhere in the area bounded by Butt 1F, Butt 3F, Seam 5f and Seam 6F, as shown below.
(Note that the "curved" line in this picture is the flat of bottom tangency tangency.) .)
52
Defining a Plate
late dialogue will appear: The New P late
Complete the dialogue as shown. If the 8mm and 10mm classes under Shop A do not appear then double click the Shop A tag. In this dialogue, for ease we have left the name as Plate_1. Note that the check box Twin across center plane has been turned on - this will create the plate information for the port side of the vessel as well. The flat of bottom tangency runs through the middle of this plate, however we do not want to break the plate there, so the Chine as Boundaries check box is turned off. Under Class, we have designated this plate as being in the Shop A, 10mm category. Note that Stock Stock for Shop A, 10mm shows as 1500x6000x10 - one of the large plates to be formed at Shop A. When you are finished, Click OK OK to to start the plate definition process. After a short pause pause while the calculations are com completed, pleted, the normal screen and cursor will be restored. To To verify that the plate has been defined, turn off the S how
button and turn the button Thedefined. name P la late te G roup S howofPthe la lates tes Plate_1 will be displayed nearon the middle plate you have.just
53
Chapter 4 At this point in time, we have defined defined one plate, however, however, it has not been expanded and so there is not yet any information with which to cut and form the plate.
lates and turn on S how P la late te G r oup . Click the Plate menu and Turn off S how P lates pick the S elect elect Item to open the P la late te Sel S election ection dialogue:
late S election election dialogue is used, primarily, to select one or more plates for The P late viewing, expansion, template creation and pin jig creation. Note that for viewing late te S el election ection dialogue may also purposes only one plate may be selected. The P la be used to edit the class of a plate. In the Plates box, Plate_1 appears with a "vu" in front of the name. This is the plate state: "v" means the plate is valid, ''u" means the plate is un-expanded. Other states include "i" (invalid) and "e" (expanded). C ontentss - Menus - Plate Menu - Select and Regenerate Refer to the Help - Content topics for further information. Click the name PLATE PLATE _1 to select this plate and then click the OK OK button. button. Next, we will take a look at the in-place mesh created for this plate. Then we will have it expanded and look at the expanded mesh and a few other attributes of the expansion.
54
Defining a Plate
late - View: Click P late
The Viewthis dialogue is used to seeexpanded, various attributes a plate. In this case, because plate has not been only theof radio buttons in the left column under the Image tab are available. It is good practice to view the in-place mesh of a plate before expanding it. In some rare cases the program produces a faulty mesh and that will prevent proper expansion of the plate. Such problems can often be detected by viewing the mesh. Try a few of the other options to see the results and then click Exit when you are done.
55
Chapter 4
late te - E x pand pand . Now to expand the plate: Click P la
The Expand dialogue dialogue is used to set how the plate will be expanded. For a C ontentss - Menus complete description of these settings, refer to the Help - Content - Menus Plate Menu - Expand topic. topic. However, However, this plate is destined for Shop A, which has extensive forming capabilities, so we will accept the defaults for the settings. Click OK to have the plate expanded. The Expand dialogue dialogue stays on screen while the expansion calculations are being performed. The time required for expansion depends on the plate shape. Long, narrow plates take the most time. After the calculations are finished, and the main screen screen and regular cursor ar are e restored, you may notice that the name Plate_1 displayed in the four views is now shown in green, rather than red. Red indicates an un-expanded plate, green shows that the plate has been expanded.
late te - View Vi ew . In the View dialogue, xpanded d Mes Mes h radio button. Click P la dialogue, click the E xpande The mesh shown will change shape slightly. Try Try some of the other views. Of particular interest for the forming of the plate are Strain Contours and Roll Marks. 56
Defining a Plate
Strain is the proportional change in linear dimension of material under applied Strain forces. Auto plate plate calculates calculates the strain which must be induced in flat plate stock to give it the shape of the hull patch it is meant to cover. The strain is presented as contours. The cyan coloured contours show the amount by which the plate material must be stretched while the yellow contours show the amount of shrinking required. When the maximum strain, displayed below the strain map, is smaller than about 1/10 % one can assume that the plate will probably fit on the hull without stretching or shrinking beforehand. When a plate is worked to stretch or shrink it, the thick thickness ness is decreased or increased, respectively. respectively. The program calculates this effect and the results may be Thickness s C ont ontou ours rs radio button. viewed by clicking the Thickne Note that Template and Pin J ig information are not available because you have not yet requested their calculation. Congratulations! You You have successfully defined and expanded your first shell plate. Since that plate was so successful, lets try the half-plate just aft: Make sure that late G r oup button is turned on. Select Butt1F, Seam 5F and Seam the S how P late 6F. Click the Create mode button, the Plate button and then somewhere between Butt1F, Seam 5F and Seam 6F and the aft end of polyobject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower.
57
Chapter 4
late te dialogue, leave the name at Plate_2, check Twin across center At the New P la plane and for Class , pick Shop A, 10mm. Click OK OK when when you are done. The resulting calculation may take a some time. When the main screen is late G r oup and turn on S how P Pla lates tes . restored, turn off S how P late Now check the mesh to make sure s ure the definition is correct: because Plate_2 was late - View Vi ew just created, it is also currently currently selected, so we can go straight to P late without having to select a plate first.
late te - E x pand pand . If the mesh is regular then expand the plate: click Exit and then P la Note in the bottom left of the Expand dialogue dialogue Plate_2 is listed as the current plate. Again, accept the defaults for this expansion as this plate is destined for the shop which has more elaborate forming capabilities. After the plate has been expanded, go to View . By toggling repeatedly between I n see that pattern: the plateremember has not changed P lace lace Mesh Mes h and E xpande xpa Mes esh h you R ol ollnded l Ma MadrkM shape significantly. shows anwill interesting this plate has a flat-of-bottom tangency running lengthwise through the middle - and the roll ontour s , notice from the strain marks show this attribute. Looking at S train C ontours values shown at the bottom of the dialogue that this plate requires no shrinking and that the amount of expansion is negligible.
58
Defining Templates
Defining Templates
4.7 Defining Templates Templates are very much as the name implies - shapes that are cut out of a planar such plywood, and used as a guide during the plate forming processmaterial, by holding theas cut edge against the plate at certain locations. In order to indicate how the templates fit on the plate, template markings are provided at user-specified locations and the template is created the same width as the formed plate so that each end of the template fits to an edge of the plate. Further,, each template has a handle - a straight reference line which is used to Further align the group of templates. While forming the plate, the templates are correctly oriented when the templates are positioned at their proper locations, all of the handles are lined up in a common sight plane and the handle tops are lined up. This is illustrated below. below. Note that the template planes are normal to the sight plane.
59
Chapter 4 With plate_2 selected, click Plate - Templates .
The Templates dialogue is used for laying out the position and orientation of templates and their handles. In this dialogue: Sight Line refers to the orientation of the sight plane. • • • •
Best Fit p positio ositions ns the pla plane ne along tthe he majo majorr axis, or le length ngth of th the e plate plate.. Hori Horizont zontal al position positions s the plane horizo horizontal ntally ly as depicted in the View window window.. Vertical ertical positio positions ns the plane verti vertically cally as depicte depicted d in the View window. window. Norm Normal al to Fram Frames es positio positions ns the plane len lengthwi gthwise, se, norm normal al to the frame frames. s.
Arrangement sets sets the interval between adjacent adjacent templates. •• • •
S pacing pacing is u used sed to input a an n exac exact t mea measurem surement. Numb Number er par partition titions s the length of the pl plate ate intoent. the giv given en numb number er of inter intervals. vals. At Fr Frames ames p positio ositions ns one templa template te at e each ach fr frame. ame. Min Hei Height ght dete determine rmines s the leng length th of the sho shortest rtest ttempla emplate te handle. handle.
Line ne group pick Since we have specified frame locations, in the S ig ht Li pick Normal to Fr ames and in the Arrangement group pick A t F r am ames es . Leave Mi Min n Hei Heigg ht at at late - View Vi ew . 1m. Click OK and then go back to to P late Template te Layout Layo ut option, the expanded plate outline Now when you click the Templa will have several coloured lines superimposed. These are the locations l ocations of the templates we specified. The template locations can be included in an exported DXF DXF.. Click the Templates option to see the shape of the various templates. Note that the template shapes are colour-keyed with the locations just seen with the layout option. The straight lines with the right-angle hook at the upper end are the template handles. The template shapes are exportable via DXF DXF.. The results of template calculations are stored in the plate file.
60
Defining Pin Jig Settings
Defining Pin JigSettings
4.8 Defining Pin Jig Settings A pin jig is another optional aid to plate forming. To To calculate jig settings, select one more then clickas the P late - Pin J ig menu item. In the P lateorPin J igexpanded dialogue,plates set theand parameters follows:
Min nP Pii n Heig Hei g ht is used to tell Auto plate • Mi plate the the lowest setting that your pin jig can accommodate. pacing ng group is used to lay out the grid of pins; • The S paci X corresponds to the longitudinal direction, Y is transverse. • The Units group sets the units used for pin jig output.
pacing ng , set X to .5 and leave the other settings as they are. Return to Under S paci the View window window and select Pin J igs . Because of the shape of the plate, the upper left pin does not fit on the plate, and so is not shown. Note that the spacing of the pins is less in the X direction (longitudinally) than it is in the Y direction (transverse).
61
Chapter 4
4.9 Defining Plates on the Stern Bulb Defining Plates on the SternBulb
First we need to alert Auto plate plate that that we now want to work with the Aft Plating latte - G roup and select A ft P lating G roup. If the Pla P late te - G roup Group: Go to P la late te G r oup item is grayed out, click the S elect mode mode button. Click the S how P la button to verify that the proper part of the hull is selected. Before we can do any plating on the aft portion of the hull, we must specify some classes of plates. If we assume we will be working with the same shops as for the forward portion, then the classification scheme will be the same. However However,, let's also suppose we have access to some 2000mm by 6000mm by 10mm stock for this part of the hull. Create a new stock called 2000x6000x10. In the Classification Plating G roup. dialogue, set up a class with this stock in Shop A in the A ft Plat Because of the high degree of curvature, the plates will have to be more wedge shaped on the stern bulb than elsewhere on the vessel Let's start by dividing the bulb polyobject in half length-wise with an embedded curve: Name
Stern Bulb Seam 1
Tab
Embedded
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Stern Bulb
End 1
r=0 c = .5
End 2
r=1 c = .5
id e view, zoom in on the stern bulb area. Make sure the S how P la lating ting In S ide Group button is turned on. Make a new plate: click the Create mode button, the Plate button and then on late te the part of the stern bulb above the curve just created. In the New P la S hop A - 10mm. dialogue, for Class pick A ft Plating G r oup - Shop Verify Ve rify that the correct plate has been created by turning off S how P la late te Groups and turning on S how P Pla lates tes . 62
Defining Plates on the Stern Bulb
Now when you go to expand this plate you should receive the message "One or more plates is larger than the specified stock ." ." This means that the area to be plated will have to be reduced in size. This is easiest accomplished by running a butt vertically to cut the bulb in half. And the easiest way to create this butt is with a projected curve.
Create a New Curve: Name
Stern Bulb Butt 1 template
Tab
Free
Control Pts
2
End 1
L = 4.1 V = 4.5
End 2
L = 4.1
And then its Projection: Name
Stern Bulb Butt 1
Tab
Projected
Type
Type 2
Projection
Side
Source Curve
Stern Bulb Butt 1 template
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Stern Bulb
Acceptable Tol Tol
.005
63
Chapter 4 Delete the last plate made and then, using the projected curve just created, define a new plate in the upper aft portion of the stern bulb. Remember to select the two boundary curves, Stern Bulb Seam 1 and Stern Bulb Butt 1, before creating the plate. Verify that the plate is where you expect it to be by turning off the S how P la late te G r oup button and turning on the S how Plates button. Now,, expand this plate, using the default settings. Now Next, view the plate. Try to compare the un-expanded mesh to the expanded mesh. Because this plate has a high degree of curvature, we should pay special Thickness s C ont ontours ours . Note the attention to the forming details: take a look at the Thickne Thick ck ened Max Max indicate values at the bottom of the dialogue. Thinned Min and Thi indicate that, for the formation process chosen, this plate must be made both thicker in ontour s , some regions and thinner in others. This is also revealed in the S train C ontours where both stretching and shrinking are indicated. Some shops cannot perform both operations.
late te - E xpand , Assuming that that only stretching is available do the following: select P la xpand d Onl Onlyy and Click OK OK.. set condition to E xpan Thickness s C ont ontours ours again. This When the plate expansion is finished, view the Thickne time there is no thickening of the plate, only thinning. Now let's plate the rest of the stern bulb, starting with the forward top section: In S elect mode, mode, select curves Stern Bulb Seam 1 and Stern Bulb Butt 1. Then in Create mode, click the Plate button and in the side view click somewhere above and forward of the intersection of Ster Stern n Bulb Seam 1 and Stern Bulb Butt 1. In the centerpla ane, New Plate dialogue, keep name as Plate_4, check Twin acros s centerpl select S hop A - 8mm and Click OK . Again, verify the plate definition: turn off S how P late late G r oup and turn on S how P lates lates . If the definition is correct, select the plate and expand it. Like Plate_3, set s et xpand nd Only . Check the results in Pla P late te - View . Condition to E xpa Lets create and expand the bottom two plates a slightly different way: Stern Bulb Seam 1 and Stern Bulb Butt 1 should still be selected. Create a new plate directly
64
Defining Plates on the Stern Bulb
below Plate_3. When that definition is finished, create c reate another new plate directly below Plate_4. Verify the definitions.
late te - S el elect ect . Plate_6 should be selected. Hold down the shift key Now choose P la late te and click Plate_5. Now both Plate_5 and Plate_6 are selected. Go to P la Expand . Note that "Two plates are selected" appears at the bottom left of the xpand Only and Expand dialogue. Set Condition to E xpand and Click OK OK to to expand both of these plates. Again, we get the message that that one of the plates is larger than the available stock. Since two plates are selected, we need to find which plate is too large.
late te - S el elect ect and P late te - View and Go to P la and pick Plate_5. Go to Pla and pick the Data tab. The bottom entry on the right side shows that the plate is oversized for the stock. The S i ze values on the left show us the overall plate size. Comparing that to the at the top left, we can see that the plate is too wide for the stock. SRepeat tock Nthis ame amesame procedure for Plate_6. Evidently, Evidently, both plates are too wide. We have just seen that these two plates are too wide, so we must split them. Obviously,, the easiest approach would be to create another seam. Obviously
late te - S el elect ect , pick Plate_5, Delete the two plates Plate_5 and Plate_6: from P la hold down the SHIFT key and pick Plate_6. Click OK OK.. In S elect mode, mode, click Pla lates tes the Delete button. In the Delete Selected Objects , with S elected P Only turned turned on, click OK OK.. Create a New Curve with the Following Settings: Name
Stern Bulb Seam 2
Tab
Surf Row/Col
Type
Embedded
Axis
Column
Parameter
0.75
Host
Polyobject: Trimmed Stern Bulb
65
Chapter 4 With the boundary curves Stern Bulb Seam 1, Stern Bulb Seam 2 and Stern Bulb Butt 1 selected, create Plate_5 as the aft, mid-height portion of the bulb. Create Plate_6 as the forward, mid-height portion, Plate_7 as the lowest aft portion and Plate_8 as the lowest forward portion. You You may have to zoom in close to point at the location of Plate_7 and Plate_8. Verify the definitions. If Plate_7 is hard to visualize, click in aPlate black- Select. portion of the screen to de-select the curves and then selectdouble Plate_7 from Now expand these four plates, again using E xpand Only . You You will find th that at they all fit on the stock specified.
66
Defining Plates on the Bow Flare
Defining Plates onthe Bow Flare
4.10 Defining Plates on the Bow Flare DefiningPlates on the Bow Flare
Now let's make some plates on the highly flared section at the upper forward latte - G roup select Fwd Plat Plating G roup. portion of Hull Fwd Lower. Lower. First, under P la Lets work down from the knuckle line and out from the centerline. In order to make plates of constant width we will lay out the seams as geodesic offset curves. To To start this process we create an embedded curve along the top of the lower forward hull: Name
Fwd Knuckle Line
Tab
Embedded
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower
End 1
r=1
End 2
c=0 r=1 c = .5
Create three geodesic offset curves: Shop B will be forming these plates. Remember Remember,, they can handle 1m x 2m stock. Lets set the geodesic spacing at 950mm. Name
Seam A
Tab
Geod. Off.
Offset
Left Distance = .95
Source Curve
Fwd Knuckle Line
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower
67
Chapter 4
Name
Seam B
Tab
Geod. Off.
Offset
Left Distance = 1.9
Source Curve
Fwd Knuckle Line
Host
Polyobject Trimmed Trimm ed Hull Fwd Lower
Name
Seam C
Tab
Geod. Off.
Offset
Left Distance = 2.85
Source Curve Host
Fwd Knuckle Line Polyobject Trimmed Trimm ed Hull Fwd Lower
As described above, the ends of geodesic offset curves of often ten do not end where we need them to. We will match these three with embedded curves which we can edit into place:
68
Name
Seam Ae
Tab
Match
Type
Embedded
Tolerance
.005
Source Curve
Seam A
Name
Seam Be
Tab
Match
Type
Embedded
Tolerance
.005
Source Curve
Seam B
Defining Plates on the Bow Flare
Name
Seam Ce
Tab
Match
Type
Embedded
Tolerance
.005
Source Curve
Seam C
Then, make the source curves invisible (Attributes - click the "X" in the Vis column). Finally, Finally, for each curve, select it, go to edit mode and pull the inboard control point across the centre line and let it snap back. On this region of the hull, plate butts have no relationship to frames. In this example, we will stagger the butts. Since the stock length is 2m, the butts should be laid out at just less than 1m intervals. However, we will use this spacing only along the top edge of the lower hull surface and the butts will converge as they move down the flare. These butts are easily created as vertical projections of horizontal source curves. In the top view, create curves A1 Src, A2 Src and A3 Src, as shown below, below, and then project each curve onto polyobject Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower as Butt A1, Butt A2 and Butt A3. Note that you should be able to use Type 1 projected curves here.
69
Chapter 4 With these curves in place, create 4 plates bounded by 1. Seam Ae and Butt A2 and the two edges of polyobject Trimmed Trimmed Hull Fwd Lower; 2. Fwd Seam Ae, Seam Be and Butt A1 and one edge of polyobject Trimmed Hull Lower; 3. Seam Be, Seam Ce and Butt A2 and one edge of polyobject Trimm Trimmed ed Hull Fwd Lower; 4. Butt A1, Butt A3, Seam Ae, Seam Be.
late te dialogue for each plate, check Twin acros s centre centre plane plane and In the New P la P lating G roup - S hop B - 8m 8mm m. select the class Fwd Pl Select all You ofou these plates expand as a irregular group. Then viewof the strain maps for each. Y will find thatand they consistthem of small patches expand and shrink of very small magnitude. This is just numerical noise and is an indication that the plates have almost no Gaussian curvature and need no forming other than bending to fit the conical shape of the hull at that point.
70
Defining a Panel and its Pin Jig
Defining n g a Panel anditsPinJig
4.11 Defining a Panel and its Pin Jig Auto plate plate has has a facility for calculating pin jigs used for the assembly of several adjacent Such an assembly is called a Panel. We will use the stern bulb plates as plates. an example. Select the P anel - New menu menu item. In the New the New Panel dialogue, highlight the names of the 6 plates on the Stern Bulb (Plates 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8) and click the A dd S elected button, elect ect , highlight OK button. button, then the OK button. Select P anel - S el Panel_1 and click OK nell - PinJ ig menu item. The following OK.. Select the P ane dialogue will appear:
Note that the selected plates are outlined in black and frames are shown in cyan. The view is along the average normal vector of the panel. That this is not parallel to the plane of the frames is revealed by the curvature of the frame lines.
eams radio Set the units to m and MinPinHgt to 0.5. Under spacing, click the On S eams Spacing and Pin S pacing pacing to 1.0. The parallel red lines button. Set R ow Spacing superimposed on the drawing indicate pin layout rows. Because you selected On 71
Chapter 4
S eam eamss , the program will place a pin everywhere a red line crosses a black plate outline. Further pins will be placed anywhere that the distance between two pins pacing cing . Click the Grid radio in a row exceeds the value Pi n S pa radio button and you will see small cross bars on the red lines. These indicate pin locations at the interval Pi n S pacing pacing along each row.
Out t in ide e frame; this means that the panel is to be assembled sitting Select Ou in the S id on the pin jig with the inside facing up. Thus the jig placement marks in the DXF output will be drawn for placement on the outside of the plates. Experiment with the A lig n controls to move the jig into the desired alignment with the plates of the panel. In the figure, no rotation was applied but the left shift button was used to achieve the configuration shown.
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DXF Output
DXFOutput
4.12 DXF Output iless Auto plate plate has has facilities for producing several different DXF files. Under the File Export menu there is a sub-menu containing Plate DXF DXF,, Panel DXF and S hell entries. Now that we have created several plates and a panel we can Expansion exercise these export items.
4.12.1 Plate Drawings
P lating ting G r oup . From P la late te - Sel S elect ect , select Plate_4 Set the plating group to A ft Pla les - E xport - Plat Plate DXF . and Plate_5 from the bulb. Select Fi les In the Plate Output to DXF dialogue under 2D check the following boxes: Fr ame mess , Templ Templa ates, es , C hord Leng ths , S tra train in C ontours ontours and Data. Under 3D check Mes h and Frames . To To the left of each check box is a small square. Click the one corresponding to Frames. A colour selection dialogue will appear. appear. Click the red square. The small square in the original dialogue will change to that colour.. Select the colours you want to use for each checked item. colour Select m under units. Click OK OK.. A dialogue in which you select the tutorial directory will appear. The DXF files will be written to that directory directory.. Click OK OK.. You will find 4 files in that directory: 2dPlt_Plate_4.dxf, 2dPlt_Plate5.dxf, 3dPlt_Plate_4.dxf and 3dPlt_Plate_5.dxf The first two contain 2D drawings and the last contain two 3D drawings. St Start art your CAD program and read in the first of these files. Y You ou will discover that • there is a layer for each selected item and one for the plate outline. • there is a layer for template layout and one for templates.
late Output to • layer colours are as chosen in the P late to DXF dialogue. • the chord length layer layer has straight lines joining var various ious points on the plate. plate. Each is labeled with the measurement between points taken through space on the hull. • there is a layer containin containing g a table of plate dat data a in text form.
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Chapter 4 4.12.2 Panel Drawings
elect ect and The second DXF output is Panel. Choose the P anel - S el and select Panel_1 . less - E xport - P anel DXF menu Then choose the Fi le menu item. In the dialogue, check all the boxes and set their colours. Click OK OK.. Now you will find the file Panel_Panel_1.dxf in the chosen directory directory. this you file in your CAD system. You will find a drawing of the panel with the. Open markings specified. The pin locations are labeled with integer pairs (e.g. 4, 1). There is also a table in which pin information is presented, keyed to the pins by the same integer pairs.
4.12.3 Shell Expansi Expansion on Auto plate plate will will also generate shell expansion drawings. Select A ft Plating G r oup Filles - E xport - S hel hell E xpa xpans ns ion. In the dialogue and all the plates in it. Choose Fi efinement and check all items and set their colours. Check Do R efinement and set the tolerance to .005 m. .005 m. cursor. Click OK OK. . The calculations take while, as marked an hourglass cursor . This time the created file aislittle called Shell.dxf. In theby drawing you will find that each chosen item has its own layer and the colour specified. Only selected plates appear appear..
4.13 Generating Reports eport - Crea C reatte. In the C reat reate R eport eport dialogue, Which ch P la late tess , Choose R eport dialogue, under Whi R eport eport Type Type, check both items. Click OK OK.. After a period of select A ll and under R calculation the Autoship Auto ship will appear. You will see that each plate in R eport epthat ort Edit Eatditor or end the project has an entry entry, , and the of the report there is a summary for all plates. The editor allows you to save the report to a file, to print it or to edit it.
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Notes
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