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Naval architecture requires specialized tools. While Rhino excels at hull form design, dedicated marine plugins accelerate workflows and provide hydrodynamic analysis. This guide covers the essential plugins for yacht designers, naval architects, and boat builders.

1. ORCA3D

The industry standard for marine design. Orca3D provides parametric hull generation, hydrostatic analysis, and resistance prediction directly in Rhino.

• Parametric hull design: Define boats by design principles (LWL, displacement, beam)
• Hydrostatic properties: Calculate stability, trim, freeboard
• Resistance prediction: Wave-making resistance estimation
• Best for: Professional naval architects, production boat builders

2. NEMO

Hydrodynamic analysis and hull optimization. Used by high-performance yacht designers.

• CFD integration: Analyze resistance and flow patterns
• Optimization: Find optimal hull shapes under constraints
• Best for: Racing yacht design, performance optimization

3. MARLIM

Mooring analysis for offshore structures. Essential for naval engineers working with floating platforms.

• Cable and line analysis
• Mooring pattern optimization
• Best for: Floating structures, offshore engineering

4. Rhino Marine Design Template

Free Grasshopper workflows optimized for marine geometry.

• Hull surface generation
• Offset surface creation
• Best for: Getting started with marine design in Rhino

5. Grasshopper Hydro Plugins

Community-developed plugins providing hydrostatic calculations.

• Floating body analysis
• Wetted surface calculation
• Best for: Supplementing commercial tools

Recommendation for Your Practice

Start with ORCA3D if you design production boats or yachts. Add NEMO if you work on high-performance designs requiring hydrodynamic optimization.

Related Reading

• Nemo for Marine Designers: Rhino Plug-In Buying Guide
• Specialist Plugins for Rhino 3D

Learn more about Nemo for Rhino 3D.