The Nupas-Cadmatic "Basic Designer" module is used for 3D arrangement design from the beginning of the ship project. The ship's basic layout with outfitting and other components is built up in a modular way. In the beginning of the design process it is possible to make simple temporary space reservations for main piping routes, casings and equipment not yet determined or found in the component library. It is also possible to use various wizard-type tools to quickly parametrically reserve spaces for cabins, staircases, elevators, etc.

Previous design data from earlier and similar projects and required space reservations can be transferred to a new ship project. This process supported by Basic Designer is supported by Design Modules (see separate article below) through which the design work of areas and systems is done only once. Stored into the data library, they can be used again in similar ship projects. A main goal with Basic Designer is to be able to integrate as much as possible of completed earlier design work into the new project automatically, so that the designer only needs to do project dependent layout adjustments. Some system diagrams can also be automatically acquired at this stage (see separate article below).

Structural ship data acquisition into Basic Designer is fully integrated with NAPA software used for hull form design, room arrangement definition, stability calculations and initial structural definitions. Structural hull design can easily be continued with Nupas-Cadmatic's Hull module all the way until production. Basic Designer is taken into use at the very beginning of the processa nd is used in parallel with NAPA's software. Typical early design iterations, when, for instance, the hull form or deck heights are still adjusted, is automatically handled with Basic Designer, providing direct access to updated 3D layout data.

As the Basic Designer is built within the same user interface and data architecture system as Nupas-Cadmatic's other modules for detailed design of machinery, piping and ship outfitting, the detailed construction design of the project or an area can begin at any chosen time, when sufficient design data is available, such as when a particular system supplier has been selected.

Nupas-Cadmatic Basic Designer saves valuable time in the beginning of a ship project, at a time when possible alternative layouts should be studied for an optimal end result. Picture shows automated cabin creation by using parametric input data.

Nupas-Cadmatic's Diagram module can also be utilised in early and basic design phases to further integrate with NAPA software. It is possible to use special NAPA Manager Applications to make system calculations for example when designing the fuel system of a ship. The calculated data including tank capacities, temperatures, pipe nominal sizes, pump capacities, etc. is then saved to Diagram module's SQL database and utilised in template diagrams pre-designed with the Diagram module. Through Diagram integration the data flows also to Basic Designer.

By producing "intelligent P&I diagrams" this way, the designer saves a substantial amount of time in the diagram production stage by automating the generation of design data.

With the COS Object Storage database centric architecture of NUPAS-CADMATIC, new features are rapidly introduced. Structuring of the design data into so-called Design Modules enables, for example, complete systems designed for specific ship projects to be stored in the database for future use in other similar ship projects. This means that the basic design work has to be done just once, and very big savings are possible. These modules are then utilized within NUPAS-CADMATIC Basic Designer to automate the generation of design data. Ideally, the designer has only to do small adjustments of the module to fit it into the new project. A typical system which should not need to be designed more than once, is for instance a ship's ballast water system.

A critical issue in loading modules from one project to another is how to deal with the different name spaces. For instance the original module may reference to a pipeline and system which are not present in the target project, or the position id of a valve in the source project may be already in use in the target, etc..

Version 5.1 introduces some basic functionality to which the design modules concept will be based on. In V5.1 users can already store modules as files and read them into another project. The system provides some interactive tools to help the user in name mapping between the projects. In the future Nupas-Cadmatic will further improve the management of these modules. The ideal is to store them into the library with some meta data, which provides information to help the user to select the best module for the purpose. Also parameterizing the modules will be an issue for the future development.