Joe_Carrick

Alex, I did a Library of Shaker Doors. I think it's in the old Forum.

Alan, Get a set of Headphones with mic. Plantronics has some nice ones and they really are not that expensive.

Note, There's a faster way. Go into the Plan Defaults and make the changes there. You'll have to do it for each floor. Then, dbl click on each room and in the Structure Tab click on the "Use Default" for the Ceiling Height. Do that for each Room - but start on the Top Floor and work down. Then Rebuild the Roof Planes.

So why use a "Slab Room Type" instead of just a "Slab"? Basically because you can "Label" the Room and it's relative to the Floor Level instead of "Absolute Elevation". It can also have a "Floor Finish" instead of being just a single material.

Jay Jay, Can you explain this statement? In what way is the model incorrect if the the basement is on Level 1 and the floors above are on Levels 2,3,etc.?

Joey, The reason we put basements on Level 1 is that the are almost always "Walk-Out" here and inevitably have some walls that are full height studs, some with a combination of Stem Walls and Stud Walls, and sometimes full height Stem Walls. Beneath all of that is a concrete "Foundation" and Slab. It's much easier to separate the "Living Space" from the "Foundation" by using Level 1 for the Basement. Often, the Basement is only a portion of the 1st Floor area, so we have Foundation that extends beyond the area of the Basement itself and forms a Crawl Space beneath the rest of the house. In reality, it would be nice if Chief would add additional Levels below Level 1 and the Foundation. They already have an "Attic Level" between the Top Floor and the Roof. Basement Levels between the Foundation and the First Floor would make it much easier to identify and Label the various Plans.

Hi Michael, That's correct. I think that particular one was either Western Digital or something masquerading as such. IAE, it was reported as being very big and using a lot of cpu. Some Anti-Virus software can also cause problems by scanning too much.

Michael, Obviously your Laptop is more capable - but not to the extent that you should be seeing that kind of lag in 2D. It sounds like some Process or Service is taking big time slices. I had a WDMFC service that somehow got started on an older Windows7 system and was just bringing the machine to a crawl. I stopped that service and bingo. Then I found that every time I restarted the system, that service would be there again. If you can't find the problem - take it to a tech and have them run some diagnostics.

Jon, Not to my knowledge. %page.print% will give you the number of page, but I don't think there's any way to make the schedule do that.

No, the OOB setting has the drywall in the "Ceiling Finish". IMO that's just a left over inconsistency from long ago. Remember that we didn't always have the "Room Material List".

Dennis, I don't think there's an inconsistency here at all. I think the "Ceiling Drywall" is an effect of having Drywall as a part of the "Ceiling Finish". With Walls it's part of the "Wall Type" so for Ceilings it should probably be included in the "Ceiling Structure". I have it set up that way in my Defaults so a Room Materials List doesn't include any drywall at all.

Joey, Your Material List is for the entire structure. Try it with just a "Room Material List".

Dennis, Take a look at the Room dbx. The Ceiling Drywall is in the "Ceiling Finish", not "Ceiling Structure". I'm not saying that Chief should include the Ceiling Drywall, but if you add the Ceiling Drywall to the Ceiling Structure and eliminate it from the Ceiling Finish it won't be reported in the Room Material List.

This is (in a way) logical. The "Room Material List" includes everything inside the room perimeter. It uses the wall surface as the limit of what's inside and what's not. By definition, the Structure itself is not inside the room. If you really think about it the Walls, Floor Structure & Ceiling Structure are not a part of the room - they simply enclose it. The Floor Finish and Ceiling Finish are considered as being "Inside the Room Perimeter". Perhaps a toggle (checkbox) to include the surface wall layers would work, but it's never going to be a perfect fit.

Terrain Modifiers & Features are the absolute best way to do this: The Pool Deck should be a Terrain Feature, not a PSolid.

Todd, Just copy the Annoset, rename it and change the default CAD Layer. It's that simple. You now have a working Annoset for the desired CAD Layer.

I don't notice any slowness as a result of how I'm doing it. If anything, having more Plan Files makes it faster simply because I'm only editing smaller Plans. If you open the Layout, you can use it to navigate to the Plan that's linked by double clicking the Layout Box. Just having a Plan open doesn't effect the speed. Speed in Chief is mainly effected by the size of the Plan that you are currently editing.

Almost all of mine are in different Plan Files.

I do details a couple of different ways. 1. Section View - Auto Detail - Clip Edges of Camera - fully annotate. (basically I use this for full Cross Sections and for Wall Sections) 2. For larger scale details I do CAD Detail from View of the above. and Trim that Detail to just include the area of interest. I use a "CAD Frame" around the detail so the Layout Box will be the size I want in the Layout - just for consistency. 3. Standard Details I have in CAD Detail Windows in dedicated "Detail Plans" which are at the Scale I will send them to Layout. (Door, Window, Railing, etc.) I do not create any of these details in the Layout File and I do as little as possible in 2D CAD. I do not place details in the Library. I've found it difficult to manage scale from the Library to Layout. For me, the Detail Drawings with CAD Detail Windows is a better way of organizing and my details are basically live. If I change a detail in a Detail Plan that's linked to any Project's Layout it is changed in the Layout.

1. Export to DWG 2. CAD Detail from View - but I personally don't like to do that unless absolutely necessary. Any future changes to the model will not be reflected in the CAD Detail.

TennVol, Your Plan is referencing files on the "F:" drive which means that I can't open it. IAE, you need to understand that the foundation in Chief is actually one or more "Rooms" - at least that's how Chief deals with it. The values for the floor elevations, ceiling heights, etc can get very confused when you try to use Level 0 as the Basement. You would be much better off deleting the Foundation and making your Basement on Level 1. Once you get everything to look right (correct floor and ceiling heights for all floors, the correct wall types, room names, etc) then build the Foundation. It will be a lot easier than trying to do it as you are currently.

Question #1 Is your Basement Level 0 or Level 1? Level 0 (IMNSHO) should only be used for the Foundation. Use Level1 for the Basement, Level 2 for the First Floor, etc. If you don't have a Basement you can use Level1 for the First Floor, etc.

Joey, The basics of doing this is to have all your Camera (Elevations & Sections) and all CAD Details such as Schedules, etc saved in your Template Plan. Then, send them to Layout and saving that as your Layout Template. When you start a new project you copy those to a new Folder, rename them to your new project name and link them. Now, with both the Layout and Plan open you can start working on your design. Almost everything you do will automatically update the Layout. Of course you will have to open the Elevations, Sections, Interior Elevations, and any other 3D Views in order to insure they update in the Layout. But you don't have to send them because they're already there.

Thanks Alan,

Another way to deal with the issue is to create the Master Window Schedule with all the windows. Then create a CAD Detail from View. You can delete specific data from that CAD Detail and send that to Layout instead of the Master. Of course it won't be live, but it works. Or, that way you could have "Existing Window Schedule" and "New Window Schedule. You can even make some of the lines print in a lighter line weight and some darker.