DenisePac

Does anyone have an idea how I would go about creating this look on top of the roof? It’s not like a dormer. Any help is much appreciated. Thanks!

Thank you everyone!

Joe, I realize this is an old thread, but how do I access the macro information within the JSON file that is in this zip file you provided? I'd like to use it and I'm not sure how to open or import it into Chief. thanks.

I did. And it seems to work with two exceptions. My walkout walls in the basement level are still snapping to the main layer. And the lower foundation wall to my pony walls where I have my stepped foundation are not including the OSB layer. Do I have to create a short foundation wall underneath my normal walkout siding wall currently marked as "foundation" in order for this to work in that area? I tried to manually move the auto dimension line to where I wanted it for those walls, but it won't work. And I need to re-define my pony walls somehow for this to work correctly. See attached for reference. Eric, thanks for pushing me to learn. I wasn't surprised by your reply. I should have known better but was hoping for a quick answer.

I want my auto exterior dimensions to snap to the main framing layer on my regular floorplan layout sheet, but I want my foundation plan to snap the auto dimension lines to include the main framing as well as the OSB layer. Would this be accomplished by simply changing my Wall Definitions to set 'foundation to exterior of layer' wall setting to include the OSB layer? See attached image of where I am talking about. When I change it, I see it does align the foundation wall to the outside edge of OSB correctly. It also requires my foundation walls to be re-align with my upper main level walls which I think is okay. However, will the auto exterior dimension tool automatically snap to this line when I create my foundation plan? And will it still only snap to the main framing layer on the main, normal walls levels?

I want the foundation walls in the storm shelter of the attached plan to be poured higher up so I can raise the ceiling just within this room. The steel bar joist in the suspended garage area would stop short of the storm shelter foundation walls, so it should work, but I'm not sure how to change floor structure above, etc. for this to build the way I want it to. FYI - this is just a conceptual drawing and is not engineered at this time. I created a cross section elevation within the plan so you can go right to the area I'm referencing. Any suggestions are appreciated. Thank you. Hope you all had a great New Year's holiday! Denise WAGNERTEST.zip

I just noticed all of my attic walls are actually sitting on a 2nd floor level vs. attic level. I have no idea how that occurred. It doesn't appear to be affecting my ceiling heights or the accuracy of roof planes, elevations, etc. This project started out with an upper level, "open below" situation so I can only assume the 2nd floor was not fully deleted when it was decided to eliminate the upper rooms. To fix this, does it make sense to copy all 2nd floor attic walls and "paste and hold position" on the attic level, then just delete the 2nd floor altogether? My roof planes and baselines should all stay in the proper places without any concerns, right? Or does it matter at this point? The attached plan was created using CA verision 12. Any suggestions would be helpful. Thanks. WAGNERTEST.zip

Also, I failed to mention, this particular plan was and is still in CA version 12 so you can use that version to open it.

Thanks for this Eric, and thanks for the previous bridge ledge vid as well. Here is a pic of my elevation as of now, doing what you showed me to do. My concrete section of basement brick ledge wall doesn't appear as thick as yours. Am I missing a step? And I noticed when the lower basement foundation wall moves out to align with the 1st level brick wall, it creates add'l s.f. in the basement. Can I modify the thickness of the basement/foundation wall within the wall definition so the inside edge of basement wall stays where it was previously, without messing with the upper level, keeping everything aligned properly? The GC is telling me to make the foundation wall a thickness 12" instead of 8". However, I assumed the 8" would be added to the 4" ledge, creating a total 12" thickness automatically. Here is a pic showing how my wall elevation looks after your instructions. Thoughts? I will look at your roof option. I did struggle a bit with finding the right "look". You're right, the back roof line gets pretty funky looking doing it this way. Here's an image of what the back looks like as I have it, before your modification. I also have a question regarding attic walls on this plan and will submit that question under a new topic. Thanks.

This is it. Hope it opens okay for you. Thanks for all of your help. I really appreciate it. WAGNERTEST.zip

I've deleted almost everything except the roof, walls, floors, windows. I'm still above 15 mb. I don't understand why it's still too large. I'll keep trying. Ignore the last attached plan file. It's empty for some odd reason....

Thanks. Try this... . Wagner-PlanTEST.zip

Robert, I tried to attach the zipped plan file but it exceeds the 14mb size allowed. Do you know of another way? You mentioned a download link?

Thanks. I watched your video Eric and my basement/ foundation wall doesn't indicate needing realignment. Is my foundation wall type definitions for that brick wall area not set up correctly in the wall definitions? Here is the cross section view image, and a couple of screen grabs of each wall definitions for the brick-6 wall and the lower foundation wall as they are set up right now. I also included a screen shot of the foundation level showing you that basement foundation wall appears to already be aligned. I suspect my wall types are not set up exactly right. Thoughts? Foundation level plan image.pdf Brick-6 Wall Type Definition.pdf foundation wall for brick ledge.pdf

Hi, The front wall and some back walls of this house were changed to brick. The basement/foundation wall already created before the wall types were changed. How can I change and adjust the affected foundation wall to reflect the required brick ledge properly without losing all of the basement/foundation interior walls already finalized? Attached is an image showing what the foundation wall should look like once updated. I tried to upload the plan file too, but the file size exceeds the 14 mb size limit. Please help.

Thanks Eric. I should have seen that. My bad. Thanks for your help.

Hi, I used Auto Roof to get started on this roof and for some reason the front of the house is showing a large gable instead of displaying it as a hip as the default is set to. I don't have any gable roof directives in that front wall and I don't see any accidental roof gable lines drawn. I'm not seeing why this is happening. I plan to make manual roof changes but always want to learn why certain geometry of the designs can trigger these strange things to happen so to avoid them in the future. Any ideas or suggestions? I attached the plan for reference. Thanks. auto roof plane defaulting as gable.zip

Ah. Thank you Eric. I will look this section up in the manual and review it all.

Is there a way to pre-select an object layer you want an item you're drawing to be applied to prior to to drawing it? For example, I am working on site plan, I'm creating a new polyline as the properly setback line. The new polyline defaults to the layer - CAD-Default automatically. Rather than having to open up the newly-drawn polyline object specifications and changing the layer to CAD-Plot Plan within its properties, is there a way I can highlight or pre-select the layer I want objects to be on ahead of time? It would be nice to be able to pre-select the object layer you want to add objects to all at once. It would save a lot of time. Let me know if I'm not clear in explaining this. Thoughts?

Hi, I generated the roof for the attached drawing using auto-build roof. Can anyone help explain why my roof plane baselines are defaulting to the inside of walls (baseline height of 119") instead of outside of wall (baseline height of 113 11/16") like normal? As a result, the roof planes show "N/A" for Top of Plate. I have some manual roof work and correcting to do, but wanted to show it to you with auto-build still active so you can see what might be causing this. Top of plate is 9' and the primary roof pitch is 10:12. Thanks TestHouse.zip

I found three out of the four you're referencing. Not able to find the %component_section_size% name or value when I select the window object, open the Ruby console and then type owner.names. I don't see it in the list. Nor could I find it using a text box and the "object properties" macro. I'm familiar with macros and Ruby language in general but haven't created custom macros yet.

I'm using the triple casement

I would like to create label macro to auto-display dimensions for a picture window with flank casement unit. i.e. label 20-4040-20; referencing 2' wide left and right casements with 4' wide center fixed. Also would like a macro to identify the DESCRIPTION in the window schedule for this type of window as... (i.e.)..... PIC W/ FLANK CS - LHL/RHR Trying to prevent having to manually create 36 different user windows if possible, but also reference the label and description accurately while still using macros where applicable and useful. Any ideas?

Thank you!!

I use closed polylines to measure perimeter lf for assisting with estimating materials. The polyline’s object specification for the number style is set for feet, fractional inches. However, the number style for the corresponding polyline label is defaulting to only fractional inches. For the polyline label, I am using the object specific macro for %perimeter and want the label to display the perimeter as feet, fractional inches. How do I change that? thanks.