DeckQuestions

I'm trying to get a materials list going for decks, but the deck plank materials aren't being factored into Calculate Materials in Area/Room.

It does work when I Calculate Materials for All Floors or select the planks individually and use Calculate Materials from Selection. I also recently discovered that it works if I calculate in area from a floor above where the planks are, even when nothing is visible on that floor of the plan.

How can I remedy this? 

My issue is that in the Count column it tells me the number of feet instead of the number of planks. The only way I can see is to open expand the collapsed selection and count the deck boards myself. 

I just need the number of planks that have been collapsed in a row, not the total square feet. I feel like there's probably an easy way to do this, but I don't know what it is.

Thanks. 

I'm trying to get stairs that look like this:

They look like this right now:

How can I achieve this?

Thanks.

Thanks, Nestor. I expect they will come in handy. 

Thank you David! That's incredibly helpful. Have a great day.

That's great, solver. Can anyone explain how to do that.

Is there a way to make the top rail of my deck railing rounded? 

How can I have a full post at the wall? If I uncheck the "half post at wall" option, the post vanishes altogether. 

Thanks.

Thanks Eric. I have what I need to continue with this project now. 

If you could explain to me the CAD portion of it, I'd be grateful. I still don't understand how you got those angles.

I'm really not following. Sorry. Could you walk me through each step?

Thanks Eric,

But I don't understand the process here. I drew a circle and some CAD lines but I'm not sure how that helps me.

You might have to elaborate a bit for me.

I need my CA walls to match these drawn measurements, but I'm having trouble getting both the diagonal-wall-length and horizontal-wall-to-horizontal-wall dimensions to agree. I think it's because CA can't/won't automatically alter the angle of the diagonal wall.

Is there a way to get everything where I want it without eyeballing and manually fine tuning the the angle?

Wrong file, sorry about that. Here's the right one.

Salim.plan

Thanks for your help, that sounds like it'll fix my issues. 

My deck railings float off the edge of the deck if I change the thickness to 2 1/2" or lower. I need a 1 1/2" thick railing that stays on the deck. 

I opened an older project, and there the rails could go down to 2 1/2" before they started floating. Maybe a setting needs to be changed, or maybe that's just how the program works? Let me know.

The pictures attached are of my black main deck at 1 1/2" rail thickness and my test deck at 3" and 2 1/2" rail thickness.

Thanks.

Salim.plan

Ah, it was in the rail settings. I didn't expect that.

I'll try to include a screenshot next time. 

Thank you.

I don't know why, but one off the deck rim joists has wall siding that regenerates whenever my deck does. I'd like to know why, and how to fix it.

Thanks.

DeckWithSiding.plan

Thanks again guys. Looks like that did the trick.

I can see from the screenshot that the subfloor height above terrain is set in the terrain specification panel. That's interesting. Well, this will definitely come in handy going forward. I'm really glad this forum and you guys are here. 

Till next time. 

Mick,

The deck is supposed to be 3' off the ground, not the house floor. The house floor should be about 3 1/2" above the deck floor in case of snow draining in to the house. 

Should my strategy going forward be to simply subtract 20" from whatever height I want to set the deck to, in order to unsure it actually gets as far off the ground as I want? That does put the deck right where I want it. Setting the grade manually to the terrain seemed like a more intuitive, repeatable, and easier to mark idea, but there may be reasons why I can't/shouldn't that I'm unaware of. I'm very new to the program.

Thanks. 

I set my deck height to 35". After putting in lattice I realized that Chief set actual distance from top of deck to the ground was about 55 inches from the terrain. 35" is, however, roughly the distance between the top of deck height and my top of subfloor, according to my Auto Story Pole Dimensions. 

How can I set my deck height to start on grade level instead of whatever it's doing now?