What do you draw on?

[Matt Carlton]

When you draw up your own plans, what do you draw on? 

Does anyone still hand draught their plans? 

Wallpaper lining paper, pencils and a Rotring pen are still my tools of choice! 

 

 

[Graham Davies 3]

Hi Matt,

I bought a roll of plotter paper. It will last me several lifetimes and was less than £20. A tabletop drawing board was £20 used from facebook market place, and assorted pencils, rulers, squares and compasses complete the ensemble...

 

I love adding another aspect to the hobby; it makes more days modelling days, and means there are things I can do in the 'clean' part of the house, so don't shut myself away from my dear wife...

 

Graham

[john stones 1 - Moderator]

Lining paper and a crayon, I don't possess the computer skills, done 4 high wingers and a couple of low wing aerobats, very enjoyable and unique at the field.

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

Lining paper for me too.

[kc]

I got so fed up with time wasted on CAD that I built a new drawing board from 5ft by 2ft of thin DIY ply (which can take drawing pins) on a light framework.   Pivots on an arm so that it either rests at 45 degrees on the benchtop or swivels up to stay drawing side out flush on wall to keep clear of bench with drawing still visible.    Top is a straight edge to use a T square in the vertical position as most plans need many verticals and few horizontal.  Thus a standard size T square can be used.   ( a king size 5ft T square for horizontal proved a waste of wood, even when used with a spring clamp arrangement!)

Drawing is done on lining paper from a wallpaper shop (Wilko) and of course is full size .    Detail drawings of formers etc are done on A4 paper so they can be scanned or copied.

[Brian Cooper]

Lining paper.   And then grid lines are scribed onto it to ensure accuracy when drawing/creating the new design.  

[Ron Gray]

Not the same, but scimilar, I used to do a lot of plans for building extensions using a parallel motion board, Rotring pens etc but got interested in CAD when TurboCAD fist hit the scenes. Despite a steep learning curve I got used to it and within 6 months had sold the old board. Many years later and I’m now using Fusion 360 for my 3D printing but use its 2D capabilities for designing ‘plane bits (but I still do preliminary pencil sketches in my notebook).

[Ernie]

Hi all.....If you are going to make a paper drawing, there is only one really practical medium, and that is black drawing ink on tracing paper...the heavier the paper the better. Mistakes are easily changed because the ink lies on the surface of the paper, and can easily be scraped off

If a new drawing is needed a second sheet can be layed on top and a new drawing made

The whole operation becomes so much easier, and faster

Hand drawings are so much better than computer aided for our rather simple needs, simply because the interface between the brain, and and the paper is much more direct, and simple drafting problems are simply resolved

ernie

 

[Matt Carlton]

It's nice to see that hand drawn plans are still a thing. I thought I was a bit of a dinosaur, but there's a lot of enjoyment in it for me, even if the completed plan never actually gets built. 

 

Time for another one given recent events. Not sure what direction to go in, but thinking somewhere between a Vans RV3 and a Minimax. 

 

[Simon Chaddock]

Plans?

Its amazing what you can do with a good 3 view from Google and some printer software that expands it to the required size.

Print it all out on individual A4 sheets, tape the required bits together and you have a plan of just the bit you are working on like fuselage, wing or tail.

It works for me. I now have a whole box full. 

[Ron Gray]

2 hours ago, Ernie said:

Hand drawings are so much better than computer aided

That really does depend upon the individual, CAD tends to be more accurate (depends on input!), mistakes are a click away rather than scratching out with a razor blade (yes I remember doing that ‘back in the day’), auto measurements quickly show what’s been drawn, fitting parts together before committing to cutting can show up potential problems.

 

But you pays your money and takes your choice.

[Matt Carlton]

There's something nice about how drawn/printed plans look vs cad style plans. Am I alone in pinning up particularly nice ones as wall art in the cave? 

[Andy J]

I use MS PowerPoint to draw all my plans. Trick is to first scale your page to A0 then paste in a picture of the aircraft that your wanting to replicate at the required scale and then simply draw around the picture using the in built drawing tools.

 

Once you have the outline then print using an A0 plotter (if you have one at work) or take a copy of the file to a print shop.

[Ernie]

And of course, there's the beauty of a well produced hand drawing. 

ernie 

[kevin b]

10 hours ago, Ernie said:

And of course, there's the beauty of a well produced hand drawing. 

ernie 

Ah, yes. I remember a lot of those "beautiful" hand drawn plans that appeared from many a well known modeller.

I even tried to build some of them. With nicely drawn ribs and formers that didn't fit the plan when you cut them out

and structures that couldn't actually be put together in 3 dimensions.

CAD plans may lack charm and artistry, but they do work.

Isn't that their prime function ?

 

Kevinb        Take off the tinted specs dept.

[Don Fry]

Yea, point taken. But my priorities revolve round other things, chutneys, jam, marmalades, and pickles.  And I have no intension to spend a year learning CAD. 

If the drawer of the failed plan can’t turn it over in the mind, there you go. It drives me mad in the early hours, when the grey cells decide to finalize the plan. Skills learned decades ago. 
 

And in fairness, a rubbish plan, parts don’t fit, would be revealed in a forensic examination. The only tools  needed is a rule, square, protractor. 
 

Assume nothing, as in ASSUME makes an ASS out of YOU and ME. 

 

Game of blood, flying model aircraft. 

Edited February 23, 2022 by Don Fry

[kevin b]

If drawing the plan is part of the design / building process I see no problems.

My issue is with those who draw (or used to) plans for publication and it was on many an occasion, blatantly obvious that something wasn't right !

I also appreciate that sometimes the journey between the designers drawing board and the printing press has been known to cause alterations.

Another interesting question is how much time is spent learning to use CAD compared to to that used learning skills years ago ?

I did art and some technical drawing many years ago in my yoof and am now trying to learn CAD.

It isn't sinking in properly yet, but I reckon if you were to start from scratch with both systems that CAD would win hands down.

By the way, I still like sorting out design problems using paper and pencil.

Well that's how we were taught !!!

Edited February 23, 2022 by kevin b

[Martin_K]

To the guys who cannot get on with CAD, I suspect you are trying to 'draw' on screen as if using a drawing board. CAD is numerical. If a line is not where I want it I just edit the coordinates. Type in the numbers and see the image change.

[Gary Manuel]

CAD is great (I used Bentley MicroStation a lot at work) but it feels a bit like doing keyhole surgery to me. You can zoom in to add / see the detail and zoom out to see the whole drawing but then the detail disappears. With a hand drawing on a drawing board, you can see the whole drawing in fine detail at all times. With CAD, I find that I need to print the drawing out at full size to be able to instantly spot mistakes which I have missed on screen.

 

Pen (Rotring) and paper or plastic / linen negative (anyone remember Pounce powder and electric erasing machines?) for me any day, but then one of the early skills I learnt was draughtsmanship, including hand printing of text. Some of the recent hand drawings / text I had presented to me by the yoof of today for checking looked like they had been done by an arthritic spider. Looks like draughtsmanship is a dying art.

Edited February 23, 2022 by Gary Manuel

[Ron Gray]

1 hour ago, Don Fry said:

The only tools  needed is a rule, square, protractor.

Rubber? 

 

1 hour ago, Gary Manuel said:

draughtsmanship is a dying art

It's a changing art.

[Lima Hotel Foxtrot]

On 22/02/2022 at 10:08, Matt Carlton said:

When you draw up your own plans, what do you draw on? 

 

 

Inspiration. 

 

And a mixture of doodles, hand sketching, hand draughting, AutoCAD and SketchUP.

[Gary Manuel]

32 minutes ago, Ron Gray said:

It's a changing art.

I'd say that (technical) drawing is a changing art. I have a lot of respect for some of the "Caddies" I've worked with. I certainly would never be able to do what they can do. I just can't get used to looking at a large drawing "through" a relatively small screen, hence the comment about keyhole surgery.

 

I maintain that draughtsmanship in the true sense of the word is a dying art. It will only get worse (or better depending on your point of view) as pens and pencils are replaced by mice and keyboards at an ever decreasing age.

 

P.S. To answer the OP. Thick lining paper and a soft but sharp pencil with a good quality eraser.

Edited February 23, 2022 by Gary Manuel

[PatMc]

On 22/02/2022 at 10:08, Matt Carlton said:

When you draw up your own plans, what do you draw on? 

 

 

 

Experience.

[David Ovenden]

Technical Drawing was my favourite subject at school  and I did quite well at it. Until it was dropped as not being a "proper subject".

Drawing my plans on tracing film(paper) with black ink. Bought a big roll cheaply from eBay as it had been opened and a few cms cut off the end of the roll. Lovely medium to draw on. And you can put outlines/shapes/ underneath and trace through.