DBCooper

There are several ways to change your current cad layer. I recommend using "edit active view" and then going to the "selected defaults" and changing it there. Once you understand active defaults, you will better understand how they control a lot more then just your current layer. You can then use them to control other things like your text and dimensions. Once you understand all of your active defaults, you can then start setting up "default sets" and "saved plan views" so you don't have to keep changing them one at a time. All of these things are covered in more detail in the training videos.

If it's not used, it should go away on it's own, but you will have to do the save, close, reopen, save again trick. If it's being used it should show up in a camera view when the layer is on. If it's an exact copy of the whole house, it might be hard to tell it's there if it is overlapping the house. You could try moving things around or turning on layers one at a time until you find it. This is all just a guess and it could be something completely different. There are other things that can make a plan really big like imbedded pictures or pdfs. The best thing would be to post the plan but since it's so large you would have to post a link to it.

If you used the "convert t symbol" from the tools menu (not the edit toolbar), this takes the whole 3d model and makes it into a symbol. This could be a very large symbol which could cause the plan bloat. You need to delete the symbol, save the plan, reopen it, and save it again to get rid of the extra data. Something silly about how the program can only find unused symbols when it opens the plan so the file size won't change until you save it. On a side note, in newer versions of chief you can place an outlet directly on cabinets. In older versions, you could convert a wall outlet to be floor mounted and then bump it up against a cabinet.

It looks to me like those two gables and the hip corner are confusing Chief. See if you can simplify the situation if it will start working better. In any case, I would post our plan or send it into tech support.

When you see strange things in the camera view, does rebuild 3D fix anything? Sometimes this will fix strange things. If I ever have problems with the "replace" tool, I will go into the dialog and change what I want instead. If you haven't done so already, you should send this into tech support.

I just made the "hole" a normal polyline using a solid fill and the invisible line style. This is what I use pretty much anytime I want to create a mask. This seems to work pretty good unless you need a real hole, like for a counter top or something.

You can click to to place a point light but if you drag you can create a spot light pointing in the direction you want.