Random Issues

[Grumple]

Howdy,

I've come across a few random issues in the last week or so, so I thought I'd ask for some enlightenment on them all at once...

1. I was moving interior walls around the other day, and when trying to move the witness lines of the temp dimensions, they would not snap to the interior wall faces... Only the centres... I could move them wherever I liked on exterior walls. What was that all about? Is there a setting I don't know about?

2. Is there a way to make walls only draw to lengths of 1m, 2m, 5m etc... ? This was regarding a client wanting to draw custom 'straw bale' walls, so would like to be able to draw them to 'bale dims' automatically...

3. 'Opening' tool... What is the point in it? : | If I want to cut a hole in something I can just edit its profile... I was in plan view trying to TAB select a floor opening the other day to no avail... It just seems an added complexity in most cases (apart from shafts)

4. Is there any way to auto calculate the volume 'cut' from a topography for the foundations of a building? i.e. - a foundation wall, footed columns etc are added to a building, how much 'earth' needed to be dug up and moved?


Any help much apreciated :)

[patricks]

Sometimes if you have a floor with a very complicated outline with many edges, it would be easier and faster to just draw a floor opening as a separate sketch rather than trying to edit the entire floor boundary. The opening tool used in walls also works well to create an opening in a curved wall.

As for the "cut" amount for footings, that's hard to schedule since more earth would have to be dug out on either side of the actual footing placement so that the workers can get down there, build and place forms, shoring & bracing, etc. But you could always create a pad underneath your footings only to get a cut amount. Keep in mind that any other pads for the building cannot overlap other pads, so their edges would have to be away from or aligned to the pads under your footings.

[jeffh]

1. I was moving interior walls around the other day, and when trying to move the witness lines of the temp dimensions, they would not snap to the interior wall faces... Only the centres... I could move them wherever I liked on exterior walls. What was that all about? Is there a setting I don't know about?

Settings>Temporary Dimensions...

This will let you control the points temp dims measure from. See attached image.



2. Is there a way to make walls only draw to lengths of 1m, 2m, 5m etc... ? This was regarding a client wanting to draw custom 'straw bale' walls, so would like to be able to draw them to 'bale dims' automatically...

No. Zoom level controls snapping. it is probably best to get "close" and then use temp dims to get it to the exact position you want.



3. 'Opening' tool... What is the point in it? : | If I want to cut a hole in something I can just edit its profile... I was in plan view trying to TAB select a floor opening the other day to no avail... It just seems an added complexity in most cases (apart from shafts)

The opening tool, as I understand it, was developed specifically to place openings into walls that are arc shaped in plan (you can't edit the profile of a wall curved in plan.)



4. Is there any way to auto calculate the volume 'cut' from a topography for the foundations of a building? i.e. - a foundation wall, footed columns etc are added to a building, how much 'earth' needed to be dug up and moved?

See the answer in the previous post.

[patricks]

3. 'Opening' tool... What is the point in it? : | If I want to cut a hole in something I can just edit its profile... I was in plan view trying to TAB select a floor opening the other day to no avail... It just seems an added complexity in most cases (apart from shafts)


To elaborate further, the Opening tool has quite a few functions besides just cutting a hole in a floor or wall. Curved walls and complicated floor objects are 2 uses mentioned. There's also the dormer opening tool, which creates a hole in a roof with vertical bottom and side edges (vertical cuts through the roof), but the upper cuts are horizontal to correspond to a joined dormer roof.

There's also Opening by Face, which will cut an opening in just about any surface, no matter what the angle, perpendicular to the face of the surface.

Finally there's the Shaft Opening tool, which will cut through multiple floors so that you don't have to keep track of the alignment of multiple openings through each floor slab.

[Grumple]

Ok... Maybe I was a bit harsh on the opening tool! Good points : )

Thanks for all the info chaps, lets hope it stays in there for a while...

[greg.mcdowell]

I think the other posts have helped with most of the questions and I wanted to add my thoughts to your second question regarding limiting the lengths of walls.

Try creating a grid plane (the blue gridded icon in your toolbar) with the unit lengths you need to hold. This can be rotated and moved as needed and will allow you to snap to the grid intersections so that you can start to constrain the lengths of your walls.

You can still create your walls so that they do not snap to these points if needed but it should get you started.

[cganiere]

1.You can use TAB to cycle through the interior partition to get the face of finish or face of core.
2.Try drawing the "walls" as a repeating detail of the bale.


Howdy,

I've come across a few random issues in the last week or so, so I thought I'd ask for some enlightenment on them all at once...

1. I was moving interior walls around the other day, and when trying to move the witness lines of the temp dimensions, they would not snap to the interior wall faces... Only the centres... I could move them wherever I liked on exterior walls. What was that all about? Is there a setting I don't know about?

2. Is there a way to make walls only draw to lengths of 1m, 2m, 5m etc... ? This was regarding a client wanting to draw custom 'straw bale' walls, so would like to be able to draw them to 'bale dims' automatically...

3. 'Opening' tool... What is the point in it? : | If I want to cut a hole in something I can just edit its profile... I was in plan view trying to TAB select a floor opening the other day to no avail... It just seems an added complexity in most cases (apart from shafts)

4. Is there any way to auto calculate the volume 'cut' from a topography for the foundations of a building? i.e. - a foundation wall, footed columns etc are added to a building, how much 'earth' needed to be dug up and moved?


Any help much apreciated :)

[Grumple]

Thanks guys, I'll look into these suggestions : )