> Chris,

> I'm intrigued and also interested in using Hulls. Would I have to purchase
> a plotter to output the designs? Other hardware requirements to note?

> Paul C.

Paul,

As Hans says in his post, the program can produce hand plots for each panel which are printed to any ordinary printer. For reference, a handplot output for a particular panel on the boat is a series of points which define the shape the panel has to be to fit correctly with the other panels. The points are defined by their x,y coordinates, i.e., from a baseline, say the end and bottom edge of a sheet of plywood, the numbers give the distance from the end and the height from the bottom for each point. The process may sound more complex than it really is. If you have ever drawn a graph, you can layout a handplot. If you search around a bit, there are some stich & glue sites that have a more complete description of the process.

In connection with laying out the panels on the plywood, one nice feature of the software is the module which lets you visually layout the panels on a display representing three or four sheets of plywood. Once you have them layed out the way you want, you can printout both the graphic and the points for all of the panels displayed.

Try the software. It is free and, even if you never build a boat from your plans, it is an awful lot of fun to play around with - better than any computer game.

take care,

Chris Luneski