Joint Work with ShipConstructor Software. Introduction.

Modern sea vessels and coastal facilities are very complex technical projects, consisting of many thousands of structural elements and require a highly professional and thorough approach to the design and production of each structural element. Thousands of components for the load-bearing structure, kilometers of pipes, and harnesses and many tons of expensive equipment is what makes a state-of-art sea vessel in this day and age. Up-to-date software allows one to make the process of drafting the working documentation for the production of such products more efficient and also helps us to visualize this process through the use of 3D technologies in our structure modelling. ShipConstructor is a brilliant example of such software, allowing one to design and draft the needed working documentation for all the basic units of a sea vessel. ShipConstructor is working within the AutoCAD, relying on the world’s most prominent design system for an efficient geometric modeller, creating 3D models of the structures and executing highly detailed work drawings. Due to this symbiosis, thousands of shipbuilders throughout the world are using these systems and efficiently applying them in their production.

There is general consensus that at the design stage of shipbuilding, great attention is paid to the assessment of the durability of structural elements in order to ensure the required reliability and performance characteristics of the final product. Up-to-date software permits the use of mathematic modelling methods for solving various problems, related to the assessment of the structure’s strength, modelling its dynamic or temperature regimes, etc. One example of such software is the AutoCAD-based universal software complex for finite-element modelling, known as AutoFEM Analysis. AutoFEM Analysis uses the 3D models of AutoCAD for representing the geometry of the modelled structure and from it, users of ShipConstructor are given the ability to make the necessary calculations, without leaving the interface of AutoCAD and ShipConstructor, systems they are very familiar with.