Aku Shaper is a practical and intuitive software solution geared towards users who need to design their own surfboard, based on specific width, thickness, length and curve dimensions.
Especially intended for surfboard enthusiasts, the application comes with complex options that they can choose from.
1,106 likes 11 talking about this. The world’s leading surfboard CAD-CAM software and hardware suite, AkuShaper is created from a board designer's perspective with a focus on continuous. AKU shaper (or APS 3000) is free. Have you tried AKU? Don't know the price of shape3d, but it is hard to beat free. As for using machines as opposed to doing the shaping yourself, whatever. It is your choice, do what you want. I don't know for sure, but I think the machining costs 50 per board at the aps3000 shape near me.
When you launch the program for the first time, you will notice that the main window includes several tabs that allow you to adjust the settings according to your needs.
Aku Shaper How To Make Square Tail
Tabs such as 'Outline', 'The Bat', 'Machine Parameters' and 'Board Info' enable you to set each dimension with extra care and preview all the modifications in real-time.
The main toolbar allows you to zoom in or out a specific area in your surfboard, add new points and guides, as well as change the measurement unit from feet and inches, to centimeters or millimeters.
Aku Shaper enables you to adjust the dimensions of your own surfboard as you want by modifying the length, width and thickness values. Simply drag each square to the right position and change the design of the current board with ease.
Since all the values are automatically displayed in the bottom pane of the application, all you have to do is to change the design of the surfboard while viewing the output result.
Additionally, you can navigate to the ‘Machine Parameters’ tab if you want to modify the cutting file variables such as ‘Top Rail Cuts’, ‘Bot Rail Cuts’ and ‘Bottom Cuts’.
To sum things up, Aku Shaper provides real surfboard connaisseurs with the right tools that help them to quickly design their own board and adjust the values according to their whims.
I've decided to try my hand at the Aku Shaper software to create an outline/template based off of my Brom fish. The software is not exactly the most intuitive thing to use (even for a computer guy like myself), but the interface is fairly simple and easy to figure out with a little time. I spent the greater part of last night making a board file by tracing a picture of the Brom fish. I'll then try to scale it down using Greg Loehr's '1/8' formula to come up with something a bit shorter and thinner.I'm having trouble printing the outline onto paper which I'll then tape together to end up with the final outline. I think I need to fiddle with the printer margins or something cause I'm getting only 1/4 of the board. Weird. In any case, here are some screenshots of what I have so far...
I dunno if I'll make a rocker template, but I did the profile outline just for fun. I think there's a newer version of the Aku Shaper coming out soon which will feature a 3D viewer. Also, if you have $65,000 lying around, you can buy the Aku machine and have it cut your CAD board designs for you. If not, you'll have to settle for the free software (and find someone with the machine). You can find Aku Shaper here.
