How do you build your hulls?

[Glass of Lime Soda]

Do you build them from keel up, deck down, build a skeleton, etc. What are the advantages to your way of building? I'm asking this because I want more ideas and I feel like I have a hard time determining how much counter weight I should have at the keel to keep the ship aceptably level. I know that heavier items are usually placed below the waterline to lower center of mass, but I wasn't sure how to apply that to armored hulls or fully metal fulls.

[Silamon]

You can just cheat and put some propellors on the bottom of the ship. That can fix an imbalanced hull by force.

As for how to build the hull, I think building the weapon systems you want to use first and then building the ship around them is probably the best way to go. That way you don't end up with a ship that is too small or too large for what you wanted.
So build a line of beams, place the main guns you want to use on that beam, and then build the rest of the ship around it. At least, that is how I have been trying to do it lately.

[R1tzo]

First step – armament development – what exactly you are going to arm your ship with. this will define your hull measurements.

You start off with building a prefab hull section: first you develop a hull shape with wood blocks, wide enough to fit the weapon systems, armor and gimmicks of choice, while being compact to save the resources, then build a section of it to save as a prefab and complete the middle section. Then you do the same for bow and stern section.

Other method is to build decks and bulkheads and then cover it up with hull – that gives you more space awareness, should you want to do some decorative work inside.
Regardless of the method, you need to keep lowest port and starboard decks empty and flooded so they serve as both a keel weight and torpedo bulges.

[jfblake90]

I build everything by components.All my weapons make up my prefabs and then I build different classes of hulls that I save into a folder. I then load whatever hull, place the appropriate weapons from my prefabs, and then build the rest of the ship from there. I periodically overhaul my hulls and weapons as I get new ideas to improve designs.

When I build my hulls I start by running the center blocks/keel all the way. It will show the shape of what the ship will look like from the side. I then add lines upward from the keel, to seperate it into compartments (these will later become the bulkheads). Then I turn on the mirror and begin shaping the hull one layer at a time. Starting from the top most forward part of the bow and going to the end of the 1st compartment.

I then do the same but from the top most furthest aft part to the end of the last compartment. I have found that once you get the bow and stern sections the body becomes super easy and rather quick.

I then fill in the bulkheads and save the hull.

[FourGreenFields]

Deck downwards. Weapons first makes it easier to fit them, but hull first is easier to make pretty. Ultimately, it's just a matter of experience.

Originally posted by Erwin the Fox:

Regardless of the method, you need to keep lowest port and starboard decks empty and flooded so they serve as both a keel weight and torpedo bulges.

No you don't. There are many ways to balance a hull, and none of the ones involving "CoM below CoB" are necessary if the shape is right.

Also, it won't really create a torpedo bulge. It may help a bit preventing rolling when the outer armour is pierced (as you don't lose buoyancy due to flooding), but it won't reduce damage (HE may lose strength due to empty space, but structural blocks will be far more effective at stopping HE).

[Glass of Lime Soda]

Originally posted by FourGreenFields:

Deck downwards. Weapons first makes it easier to fit them, but hull first is easier to make pretty. Ultimately, it's just a matter of experience.

Originally posted by Erwin the Fox:

Regardless of the method, you need to keep lowest port and starboard decks empty and flooded so they serve as both a keel weight and torpedo bulges.

No you don't. There are many ways to balance a hull, and none of the ones involving "CoM below CoB" are necessary if the shape is right.

Also, it won't really create a torpedo bulge. It may help a bit preventing rolling when the outer armour is pierced (as you don't lose buoyancy due to flooding), but it won't reduce damage (HE may lose strength due to empty space, but structural blocks will be far more effective at stopping HE).

Do you mean the weapons deck? The main armament can go fairly deep into the hull, so I don't know if you're referring to the deck level that weapons are mounted on.

[Rampant Rabbit]

I tend to build weapons first. So a basic skeleton to support turrets. That lets me look at length and width so the turret(s) have decent firing arcs. That then gives deck height, especially if you've remembered to leave enough turret parts to extend through a few layers of armour.

For bonus points, make turret blocks. I like sticking my turrets in an armoured well, and if you save those as prefabs, it makes it simple to plonk down turret blocks as self-contained elements.

Once I've done the turret skeleton, I can then see how deep and broad the ship will be. I figure leave a couple of metres between bottom and sides of lowest/widest turret well and start shaping the outer hull up from there. I also keep an eye on where the CoM is so there's room for a 5m high thruster (3m prop + 1m border) along that line to help with steering.

I build the hull bottom-up and as that slopes outwards (normally), gets thicker as it goes up. So room to criss-cross hull beams, add air gaps/ballast chambers, wood beams to de-frag damage or your choice of composite armour. But basically start with functional boxes and then shape the hull around those.

(Then look at the gaps remaining, think 'Missiles' and 'So, not exactly a cheap ship now'.)

Then I look at the flat slab of bow and think.. maybe I should have started there.. Transitions are always fun. Alternative approach is if you know how wide you want the functional space to be, start bow-first. So for example 4m triangle/inverted triangles & downslopes for best drag, building down and out until your hull interior is Xm wide. Then add a few metres either side because HUGE PISTONS!

PS.. here's an example of one of my most complex shapes.. I mean ships:-

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1546370179

Size was basically set by the width of the turret, plus width for the large torpedoes either side of it.. then a lot of experimenting..