Week 1 — Computer-Aided Design

September 9, 2026

What I did

At first I thought I would be able to design my final project boat straight away in CAD, as the picture below shows. It turned out I had a hard time getting used to Fusion.

Fusion 360 viewport showing a hull sketched across several construction planes — My first attempt: a hull built from sketches on multiple construction planes, meant to be joined with Loft.

Process

My first idea was to create multiple planes, draw a face on each of them, and then use Loft to join them into a hull. That did not work out the way I expected.

So I decided to play around with easier shapes instead, and build the boat mainly out of extrusions.

Rendered Fusion 360 model of a simple sailboat with hull, mast, mainsail and a curved front sail — Where I ended up: a simpler boat, built mostly with extrusions.

I am quite proud of my gennaker — the front sail — which I find rather elegant. It genuinely looks like there is wind in it. My mainsail is still a bit too straight. I got this effect using the Patch tool in Fusion.

What I learned

I learned a lot for a first time using this software, and I really want to get the Loft feature working for my final project. The part I expect to be tricky is the hull, along with a bulb shape for the keel.