CJSpud

Mike: If you subscribe to Fine Home Building, there was an article in the April/May 2011 issue titled "Structural Solutions for Small Bump-outs" by Debra Judge Silber that reviewed several different bump-out scenarios and how to address the structural issues. If not, you may be able to find it in your local library.

Mike: Maybe you'll need to get an engineer involved in your design "IF" the buiilding officials you'll be dealing with don't like your bay hanging by the side walls. Perhaps some sort of angle braces supporting the bottom will be needed.

I don't believe Chief is programmed to calculate mortar for a CMU or brick wall type, even if you specify the mortar thickness for the CMU or brick material being used. If this is something that is important for your business, please submit your request in the suggestion forum.

Joey: How thick is your floor system? If your floor system is about 12" thick (9-1/2" joist + 3/4" Subfloor + 1=1/2" Sill), then it appears you may be getting just what you ordered. Just guessing at this point.

Dermot: Thanks for that information!!!

I never worried about a materials count for trusses since they are supplied by the truss manufacturers (about 100% of the time around here). Does Chief even count the lumber in a truss and include it in a materials list?

Is it possible the plan view gap really doesn't exist? By that I mean, is the slab elevation and the deck elevation different? If so, that might explain what appears to be the gap in your image. If the elevations are the same, then there's something else going on and it will remain a mystery until ......

Never tried this but seems like you could manipulate the Z value of several objects (rocks) and then block them (???) and then try doing a distribution. Then if you want to do away with any repetitive scaling, go in and manually manipulate the positions (X,Y) and height (Z) as desired. If you can't use distribution for the blocked items, then just try copying them and follow up with the same manual manipulation to get rid of tiling effects so that your stones look more or less randomly distributed. Probably a lot of work but sometimes that is what it takes to make things look good.

I won't disagree on the couches but all else looks really good. I bet Jintu could point you to some nice couches somewhere.

If you want to include the 1/2" sheathing to your exterior dimensions defaults, you need to go to your exterior wall type dbx and move the exterior sheathing down to include it with the framing layer for your main layer. I suggest you change your measurement accuracy in defaults to 1/8". I think 1/4" is a bit much. Once you have your dimension defaults where you want them, I suggest you delete all your dimensions and then re-establish them by using auto exterior and auto interior dimensions. Some of your dimensions aren't exactly what you want. You need to clean those up 1st by selecting the different walls and checking them (do this first before my other suggestions).

Have you tried "dragging" (shear) blocking across the top of the walls to close the hole?

I think I would just change the glass to a screen material.

Dennis: I was talking about the "Edit Wall Layer Intersection" tool. I tested it with a deck railing and I get the same results you do. Not good for just trying to use Chief's deck tools.

Dennis: Does your corner need cleaning up with the corner connection tool?

Daniel: Have you looked at any of the two-story plans posted on the Chief website or in the sample plans?

This thread is a good start: https://chieftalk.chiefarchitect.com/index.php?/topic/23-how-to-get-good-answers-when-you-ask-questions/

Thanks Joe. I am experimenting and may (probably will) have another question or two about your method.

Joe: Thanks for posting the plan. I am curious as to why the bottom rail is shown as 1x4 and the rest 2x4 but when you look at it in 3D or XSec, it looks like it is also 2x4. Also, why does the railing, in XSec, extend up into the beam? Thanks.

Yup ... I see that ... should have spotted that. Anyway, sounds like you're good to go. Sometimes it seems like some of the easy stuff to do in Chief is the hardest to figure out. I just went through this very question with my last project and still couldn't remember exactly how I did things without going back in and checking it out all over again.

I see Scott gave you the right answer - 'sort of' .... but, the right or left options also give you access to make changes on the line style.

Michael: In the Cross Section/Elevation Camera Specification dbx, you have a bullet in the "Center" Placement position. If you temporarily change the bullet to one of the other options (Left Side, Right Side or Both Sides), you can then access the Cross Section Line Style to make any desired changes to it. I think that if you wanted to change the color or the line style of the callout itself, you make those changes using the Active Layer Display Options for the Cameras layer. Of course you could add other camera layers if you wanted to have different callout line styles or colors for different things.

Joe: Thanks for looking into that for us. I appreciate it. Not sure if I will change what I am doing now based upon your research. I have toyed with the idea of changing to Arial several times over the years but I like the "draftsman hand-drawn look" of CB.

Richard: I've never paid any attention to that check box before. Thanks for bringing that to our attention. Now I need to see what Cheif says about it and maybe do a test.

Wendy uses Arial ... I use Chief Blueprint. It has been awhile since I even checked the actual print height to see what 4.5 Chief Blueprint actually measures at.

Joe: I believe you are correct. I think Wendy just forgot what 4.5 height was. I think I actually started using 4.5 myself because of a thread post Wendy did several years ago. The height 6 actually gives you 1/8" print size at 1/4" = 1'.