*sigh*

I suppose that you guys wont look at it any other way. You can design a hull, rig, whatever you want from the ground up with software such as what Jake and I use. I don't care what kind of numbers you have to crunch, you can do ALL that in real time and see the effects of your design changes. I know this because I've done it before, not with beachcats but with air powered paintball markers whose precision is magnitudes greater than that of sailboats. I designed a barrel that provided the same accuracy of the name-brands but consumed 17% less gas per shot. I never even put a pen to paper, I had an idea, a basic knowledge of the dimensions involved, and I used Solidworks to come up with the design, then I think ProE to simulate the gas expansion. Am I an engineer? No... I'm a history major with a knack for thinking about things from a different perspective. All those who poo-hoo this method really irritate me. The only reason I don't show you people up and design a boat from scratch here is because I know practically nothing about aspect ratios, sail plans, or operating loads and other basic boat building knowledge.

If you want to continue to design things the "old-fashioned" way then by all means, I'm all for it, but don't tell me it can't be done as well using CAD because I KNOW it can.