aftercorbu

Actually two of my outside guys are experienced with, and enjoy Chief. That is what started me down this path. As I had mentioned I have been a PC and AutoCAD user since day one'ish... well actually i got my first job because of my lettering, but cad followed pretty closely behind. I am 49.

Thanks for the response. I am working through the tutorials and i am likely going to do a small project with CA soon. Much appreciate the advice and look forward to participating on the forum. What I think can work to keep the model sizes down is to detach the multitude of units within the floor plate into bays, with a noted reference to a particular unit plan. This is how we handle work flow in AutoCAD now, but we do Xref the units into the overall floor plan frame work. There is an advantage to having all the units defined across a floor in context for some engineering purposes. I am going to keep thinking through the options here and keep this thread up to date with my findings. Thanks! I will check out those two resources for sure. Cool! My thoughts exactly. Thanks Richard. We may well end up in that software, but am studying CA hard right now. Our team building work flow will become an issue if we get busy. In the meantime I am looking for a unique software that will be useful as a bridge to that expensive software and its presumably steep learning curve. ___ Personally I don't have a problem integrating traditional 2D CAD into the work flow and SU as well for very early down and dirty form and massing studies. I don't believe there is a one size fits all software package at this point. But CA's very robust residential focus would be helpful for at least my potential wood residential frame projects. Just need to sort out the best way to handle repetitive units within a floor plate and stacked. My concern is that for a larger building the software will bog down if I populate each unit with all its data. Unless there is a the equivalent of blocks in CA. Our high rise work is actually very straight forward from a drafting standpoint except for the building envelop. Receptive correctness of the unit plans is where the magic occurs in terms of efficiency and scale. Also we need to start thinking about how our engineers would coordinate with us. I suspect sending them .dwg files will not be possible with CA? I will starting thinking through a hypothetical CA work flow and share it in this thread as it develops. Thanks to all for your initial feedback!

Hello, And happy thanksgiving to fellow USA dwellers. I am an Architect that is fed up with PC and AutoCAD, but use them (and have since AutoCAD "one") in my office setting. My wife and I (we work together currently as well) are exploring the creation of a virtual studio model [namely the two of us working out of our robust home office and using remote contract employees as needed) going forward. No time is set for the change to this model. My current firm is a 'commercial' architectural firm but our profitable work is very heavily loaded to residential... just not the single family sort. High Rise Condominium, Mid Rise Multi Family, Hospitality, and Retail are the responsibility of my studio. My wife and I are Mac based at home and within our virtual studio model. I am testing out CA and there are many things I really like about it. Conceptually here is what I am thinking as to multi family mid and high rise. Create the shell with floor structure, columns, demising walls, exterior walls, foundations, and roof. Our high rise is cast in place concrete > so concrete columns, concrete shear walls, CMU exterior walls, and metal stud corridor walls and demising walls. So I think I can customize CA a bit and pull that all off very efficiently. Our mid rise is mostly wood frame. Sometimes wood frame on concrete podium and sometime on slab. Often our condo work is a wrap with parking in the center either structured or surface. Then Create the unit plans file. All the detail for the units (CA excels at this it appears) resides in a single plan type - Unit 'A' - so to speak graphically keyed into the overall plan using the demising center walls. Keep these two files separate and coordinate the geometry of the exterior walls, columns, and the demising walls carefully. Assuming there is not an Xref equivalent in CA. This would allow me to handle the shell, structure, etc. And my wife to handle the unit planning and detailing. Thoughts? Part of the decision as to which software to use must consider the nature of our work. Thanks so much for taking the time to read and respond with your thoughts - and suggestions. I did search for terms like multi family and condominium but came up mostly blank on these forums. Best, Jim