Michael_Gia

Auto build roofs puts the roof height back to default and fixes the gaps but now your roof is no longer at the desired lowered height of -24”, as David and Kitchen Abode pointed out. Once you drop the roof again the gaps return. I am able to “fix” this at the front end of the house by making the floor above the garage 24” thicker but that only works if I’m ok with dropping the ceiling inside the garage for the entire ceiling surface of the garage (which I’m not) but I just want to point that out to show that the problem is definitely coming from the fact that the roof is being lowered to expose the floor structure above.

The funny thing is that even dragging the wall down doesn’t fix it. Always leaves a gap. I’ve even tried, “extend wall past floor below” and that also doesn’t help. I thought there would be a way to add wall material to edge of floor, you know how we do with deck floors?... Nothing.

So, I often have this condition where the exterior wall above garage is inset as shown below. Then I will often/always lower the roof over the garage to reduce the distance from the top of the garage door to the soffit. (it looks nicer) (the plan is for demonstration purposes only, my actual plans are even uglier) haha. Anyway the plan is attached and the problem is those gaps above the garage roof created by the exterior wall above which won't extend down to cover the side of the floor. (I'm guessing) I've always just slapped on some p-solids to cover my shame, but there must be a more intelligent solution? Test from Template.plan

Sometimes by raising the roof just an eighth of an inch will get the trust to rebuild and span across to create the soffit. It’s a hit and miss with cantilever trusses.

I think security is the big feature but that's pretty much under the hood and out of sight. Other than that I don't notice any noticeable improvements in performance. Chief works as before. I hate getting used to all the new UI changes. I didn't have a problem with what was there before. If anything, I'm starting to question why the hell am I on a Mac anymore in this day and age of gmail, dropbox and online apps. I don't think there's any advantage anymore and as far as X13 it seems I'll be missing out on some new features. Starting to get that left out feeling of the 90's when so little was available for Mac and all the good stuff was only designed for Windows. Seriously thinking of switching again. It's actually easier this time around. The more the MasOs changes the more it starts looking like my iPad. I don't think I want that.

When you draw a deck and the posts are drawn automatically from the deck to the foundation below then you can just click on the individual posts and unlock the top height and make your post whatever height you want.

Use invisible walls to mark around your lower staircase. Adjust the ceiling height and then add a p-solid for the sloped part. Or a ceiling plane with a slope if you’re comfortable with that. You can also work from the floor above but instead of adjusting the ceiling height you’ll be defining the area as “open below”

Nevermind mind I changed “standard” to “internal” to get the inside square footage. Your method also allows to control the text more freely since my way uses polylines and therefore is stuck in that dreaded “polyline, labels” hell.

My way is definitely convoluted but I need to be able to control those independently of the room size. As in, stretch a polyline to see what area it gives before I make a modification to a room or area. I also forgot a decimals place in my calculation. However your calculation doesn’t return the correct area. I copied and paste and got 6.97 sq m instead of 5.2 sq m in my little plan.

I’m no macro genius, but here’s my method: 1) select room and “make room polyline” (I put these polylines on a separate layer so I can turn them on and off) 2) In the “label” of the polyline specify a “user Defined label from the list” (a macro that you’ll create in step 3) 3) now you need to create a macro for that list: 3a) Go to menu > CAD > Text > Text Macro Management > New 3b) >Name: Give your macro a Name, ex. roomAreaMetric 3b) >Value: “((area)*(0.9290304)).round(2)” <- type the crap between the quotes, don’t ask. 3c) > check “Evaluate” 3d) > Context = “Owner Object” 3e) > OK Your polyline will have the area in metric rounded to 2 decimal places. (that’s what the “2” is in the “round(2) part of the formula. If you want both imperial and metric in the same polyline label then you can add a second line in the polyline label which is just: “%area.round% sq.ft”

I’m a big fan of your construction docs, actually. They are the nicest I’ve seen in this forum without a doubt. I feel your comment is a little like what people used to say about horse and buggy when the car was first introduced, though. I just want Chief to really improve in the con docs creation department.

Weak points of Chief: We need to be able to snap to any line/point or part of a parametric object, and in any view or whether in plan or layout. You shouldn’t have to open a separate program to work on a layout. Archicad has everything in one place, plans, layouts, sections, PDF plan sets, etc... And yes, you can link stuff from other plans. How about being able to dimension between any two point on an elevation or cross section? How about a measure tape tool that actually works at any zoom level? Not inherent to construction documents but it is part of the process. I’m only pointing this stuff out because it seems that Chief isn’t really working on our ability to produce construction documents in a coherent way. Their effort is visuals aka rendering etc. I don’t need anymore advancement in the pretty pictures department. Chief is already great for that, I believe.

AutoCAD is hardly comparing apples with apples. Chief has its strengths but for construction documents we’re way behind Archicad and Revit.

Compared to what? I’m curious.

We’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas.

Construction docs are not Chief’s strong suit.

nevermind, apparently this Offset feature doesn't work very well if there's no room definition. also weird but maybe that's a Mac thing as well.

I'm trying to understand wall offsets in the Wall Type dialog box. See screenshot how the wall below is not lining up the way it should be according to the Wall Settings indicated. Test 2020.plan

How about, design it in Chief, build it, and then take a photo afterwards? Might be faster? (kidding)

Select all your roof planes. With the "Transform/Replicate" tool raise your roof whatever height you want in the "move" "Z" plane. If needed, you might need to draw in some attic walls if they're not on auto rebuild already. Or, maybe think about building a new floor level for that space.

I dabbled extensively 1 year ago. Short List of Archicad quirks: - Forget quick and easy kitchen cabinetry. - Baseboards? Archicad? What’s that? Interior trim is almost impossible. You won’t even find an instructional video on this. The closest thing they have works like Chief’s moulding polyline but it doesn’t recognize door and window openings. You have to trim those out. - You want a room label? Ha ha ha! Archicad uses “zone stamps” although infinitely more powerful and customizable they are a real chore to implement. - Let’s say your garage door sits between your foundation level and ground floor. Archicad will not cut an opening on a different floor level other than the floor level that the door was drawn in. You have to go back and cut a hole in the foundation wall if your garage door was drawn on your main floor. Chief Superiority: Chief is by far the quickest route from plan to 3D. Chief is by far the quickest route from 3D to framing. So, other than trimming, cabinetry and framing Archicad is on another level, that is, if you want to put in the time. Other Archicad strengths: Collaboration, Dimensioning, and Construction Documents. If you’re coming from residential stick framing don’t switch. If you do, You will be back and will be $5000 poorer.

Make it yourself? Save the image on your computer. Goto your User Catalog >Right click >New >Material Pattern Tab: Give it a name, Texture Tab: Texture Source: Browse to the saved image. Scale: X = 6”, Y = 6” Bump Map: Browse to same image. Ok paint image on object.

Archicad.

Use the trim and extend tools. You can also use point to point.

That doesn’t look like a foundation plan, by the way. I don’t know about you guys but my foundation plan only has foundation walls footings and bases for columns etc. If I include anything else on that sheet my cement forms contractor will shoot me. I draw my bases on the foundation plan on a foundation Layer Set. In general, if you draw your plans in Chief the same way you would build that home, you’ll run into less of these kinds of problems.