glennw

In the meantime, this may help https://chieftalk.chiefarchitect.com/index.php?/topic/2295-fantastic-new-solution-found-re-how-do-you-show-partial-open-railing-stairs-and-how-to-show-the-door-to-the-basement-stairs-underneath/

Post the plan

Select the Wall Material Region tool. Shift Select the area where the Regions are and Delete. Or...in a plan or 3D view, turn off all other layers, select and delete. Or.....

The icon behaviour occurs because you haven't used the icon in that view yet. The icons only indicate the tool used in the last window they were used in, not the generated window. Make the floor plan window active it the icon displayed will be the last one used in that view.

To control how the foundation walls line up with the floor above, you need to make a setting in the wall definition. Open the wall Type Definition dbx ( for the wall above the foundation wall). There is a section called Wall Settings. Change the "Foundation to Exterior of Layer" setting. Auto build the foundation. As Joe said, you also need to configure your default foundation wall as needed.

Larry, I use the Advanced Search option in the Help file all the time. I particularly like "with exact phrase". I just tried it and it took me straight help for the correct dbx.

Bill, Not sure if I am getting you wrong or not, but I can snap to objects on a reference layer.

Larry, Defaults...Camera...General Camera...General panel...Options...Show Lower Floors in Floor Overviews.

Thanks Joe, My Break Line hotkey is BL and I did try using it twice and it didn't work. I don't think I was doing it fast enough cause if I do BLBL really fast, it works. Easier for me to double click the icon. Who would ever have thought to assign 3 as Break Line!

Scott, Yes, only good for a flat site where the footings are all at the same level. I guess the main purpose was to establish that there IS a stem wall involved and to demonstrate the relationship between the slab, stem wall and footing. I learnt a lot by going through the exercise.

Scott, Is there a Complete Line Break hot key - I can't find one. I know there is a Break Line hot key - but the complete break?

Don't try and build small wall sections either side of the garage door. Make it all one brick wall that includes the brick piers AND the garage door. Then use the Material Region to cut away the brick over the door.

Use the Break Line tool (double click) to completely break the polyline at the 2 points where you want to break it. You will now have 2 separate polylines. Select one of the polylines and use the Close Polyline tool to create an enclosed polyline. Same for the other polyline.

Scott, The stem wall is built between the top of footing and and zero floor level (that part of the stem wall above the slab is a kerb - you can see this when you drop the floor below zero). The slab sits hard down on the footing. So most of the time, you are not aware of the stem wall as it is hidden by the slab - but it is still there and you can change it's width. So...if I want to force the footing down lower away from bottom of the slab, you have to increase the depth of the slab - Chief doesn't allow another way to do this. BUT, I don't want a thicker slab, so I add another layer to the floor structure (under the concrete) and give it a no material. We are then lucky because Chief knows to create the chamfer under the concrete floor layer and not the no material layer. The horizontal line you see (which I can't hide) level with the top of the footing is the underside of the slab - or the underside of the "no Material" layer of the slab.

Joe, Sorry, I forgot to attach the pic.

Alan, Thanks for the tip - just our style! We will be there Tuesday 8 - the day after Labor day. 1 day too late!

Do yourself a favour and learn to use auto build the roofs. On a plan like that, it is a no brainer. Group select all the walls that the steeper pitched roofs sit on. On the Roof panel, enter 10" in the Pitch box. Turn on auto build roofs.

Alan, I am spending a couple of nites in Carmel in September (after going to Idaho with D. Scott). I might ask you for some tips if you have the time?

Ralph, No need to redraw the plan. I don't know why the wall layers would flip, but very easy to fix. Select the wall and on the Edit toolbar, select Reverse Layers. You may want to go to General Wall Defaults (Alt+Q) before reversing the walls and specify what wall layer you want the walls to reverse around.

Well, I beg to differ. My take is that a mono slab footing IS made up of the slab, a stem wall and a footing. The thing you are missing is that Chief tries to force the stem wall to be the same thickness as the slab. And the bottom of slab sits directly on the footing. I can just about auto build what Joe wants. Well...I can do it, but there are few lines that display in section that you probably don't want to see. Materials would report correctly to the material list. You can probably guess how I did it. The main purpose, though, was to demonstrate that there is a slab, a stem wall and a footing. Have a look at the auto detailed section below and the 3D - is that what you are after? (you may not want the brick ledge - that is optional.) I still need to play a bit more to clean it up. Yes,I agree, we should be able to do this. As I said above, Chief actually uses a stem wall to create the detail and therefore recognises the stem wall. What we need is the ability to adjust the height of the stem wall independent of the slab thickness.

There are toilet partitions in the Core Catalog library that may help. Architectural...Fixtures...Partitions

Jean, It appeared that at one point in the vid you did get the window up against the thicker wall and then you moved it away again. I have no problem doing this in X or X6. Is this what you are trying to achieve?

The attached plan seems to be OK - what is the problem?

How about a polyline solid with a molding polyline around the perimeter with a custom shaped molding attached. Both with Mirror material. If you get stuck, a little assistance from the help file you should help you out.

There is definitely something wrong with those coordinates. I think you are in NZ. Wellington is about 41deg S and 174.5deg E.