Alaskan_Son

It's the request for a 3D model that leads me to believe it's a lot more than just reading plans. Although...I guess you could be right. I suppose the 3D model may be a good method of illustrating what the 2D plans are supposed to be communicating.

With all due respect, are you going to be able to teach something if you or one of your colleagues haven't or aren't able to draw it up yourself?

You're probably using a smart phone or tablet and automatically being directed to the mobile site. Bottom of page...Full Version. I personally have a strong dislike for mobile sites.

Definitely not an ideal solution, but you can use a rectangular polyline or box with a fill to address this. This method has the added benefit of being fully dimension-able without the use of point to point.

Russ, it would be super helpful it you were to attach the plan. You will usually get a solution or answer pretty quickly and it would eliminate a lot of guesswork. Chief can be pretty finicky at times and the solution can often vary due to any number of details and dynamics (and those can totally vary from plan to plan).

I used end to end dimensions (which automatically insert points when snapping to cross section lines), and then just reduced the marker radii to zero...my standard practice for point markers. You're right though. Wouldn't work for inset doors or drawers.

This makes good solid sense. On a side note, not sure why I didn't notice it before now... Its not a perfect solution, but you can create an elevation flush with the cabinet face (essentially deleting the door and drawer fronts) and then set the backclip distance (essentially deleting shelves) for face frame/drawer box details.

Neither do I. Try to avoid it as much as possible.

Not that this won't work, but how is this different from using the point to point dimension tool and just changing the marker radius to zero? This is what I personally do whenever I have to use point to point.

Are you talking about drawer openings, drawer boxes, drawer fronts, or...?

Messed around with it for a bit. Not sure where it gets those default heights from. Must be some internal thing within Chief. If you go into the elevation and make that wall longer and shorter it does some strange things. Without a defined room, it must be defaulting to some internal algorithm.

What the guys above said...post the plan. I would guess from what I can see though that the ceiling isn't missing. What you're seeing are parts of the roof above. I think your roof planes just need to be adjusted.

I agree. Not a video card issue. It looks like one of the issues I described in my post above. Chief won't draw lines where an EDGE does not exist. This is an issue I really think needs to be fixed and something that should probably be added to the suggestion section.

Use the Adjust Material Definition tool...

I think you'll love it. Welcome to the community Robert!

Can you post a screenshot showing the "missing lines"? I suspect whats going on is that you're not getting lines that YOU believe should be there but that Chief will never draw. Its a little difficult for me to fully describe, and I don't understand all of it, however Chief seems to use PATTERN settings for many of its lines (which may not look like the TEXTURE), and edges for the rest. It will not draw a line where a true edge does not exist. For example, where 2 objects on 2 different planes occupy the same space...that inside edge won't draw even though you know its there. To get that edge line to draw, you need to make sure one or both objects actually have an exposed edge at that location. There are also some complex shapes that will have no lines show up because there is no specific edge to draw.

No too shabby Johnny!

Still a weakness in my opinion. That one single plug-in is like $750 and it really isn't all that great. Plus you have to deal with a handful of other plug-ins and their related expenses, updates, support, etc. and all those plug-ins may or may not work properly with futre updates of Sketchup and/or your other pile of plug-ins. Do you use Sketchup for producing plans? You might, but I can't help but notice the vast majority of people I've heard touting Sketchup's amazing abilities don't even use it. I know from a little experience that most of the hype is just that. Hype.

I would definitely recommend Chief then. You can pretty easily hit the ground running with it for simple 3D renderings of basic designs. Just be prepared to spend a fair amount of time to become proficient at it and to be able to draw up more complex designs, details, and plans. My take on Sketchup: It comes across as very intuitive for simple little things and as such is a little deceptive. In my opinion, its really quite cumbersome to use for anything of any complexity. I know of a handful of tradesmen who use it to draw up details, but know of very few builders or designers that do. In order to make it feasible for use as an architectural design program, you would almost certainly have to purchase, download, and learn a huge pile of 3rd party add-ons and even then, I really don't find Sketchup all that effective for most modelling. I actually find I can model most things quicker in Chief. Everyone will point you to Nick Sonder (a well know architect that uses Sketchup for his design work), however just ask yourself this...Why is there so much attention given to one guy who uses Sketchup as a full architectural design program? I think the answer is that its probably somewhat of a gimmick. There's no one architect famous for using Chief because so many do.

We use both and I agree with Eric. They are entirely different tools. Barely comparable at all in my opinion. What do you do for a living? And can you be more specific about how you would be using the software?

Yep. This works for drawing walls. Unfortunately it doesn't work as well for other operations. Steve, Now you have 5 options. Hopefully 1 of them will work for you.

Whatever you do, please don't attach the plan. It makes figuring things out much more difficult. Taking wild guesses is much more efficient for everyone involved ;-)

I couldn't open either

I was wondering how you would operate the scroll bars without your mouse and so I started messing around with it for a bit. By golly, you're right. Never knew this functionality existed... Left click to start operation as usual...Move mouse pointer out of view window...Right click off screen without letting go of left mouse button...Let go of left mouse button. Now you can use scroll bars and simply left click to finish operation. Very cool. Thanks for starting me down the path to this little hidden feature Joe!!

You can use the arrows keys to pan around the plan with your free hand. That's about the best I've come up with.