para-CAD

I see Chief as a two-pronged tool mostly. 1. Sales tool with great 3D modeling to educate clients on what they are getting with their design 2. Creator of construction plans for permit. Sure it does more, but for me, I get paid to create plans for permit and it has NOT been easy to get up to speed with Chief. I give MUCH credit to DS Hall, The Alaskan Son, ChiefTutor and all the others who have taken the time to create videos to SHOW how to use Chief effectively. Thank You! I would like to see a collaboration between the smart/talented people here to develop "the perfect" residential layout template. (well actually it would be close maybe) It could follow the general format we would all vote on: Cover Gen Notes Design Criteria and State/Local specifics Site/Plot Plan Ecology Foundation Basement Plan Basement Framing First Floor Plan First Floor Framing Second Floor Plan Second Floor Framing Elevations Sections Schedules Roof 3D Not all would apply for everyone, but a thorough starter template would be great. Each page would have basic text and details located (current IRC code etc - if allowed by copyright). All items would be customizable. It would be nice to have some of the ruby macro tools already populated and ready to use or delete instead of spending so much time trying to discover if something is possible. The "work-around" term is wearing thin with me. A work-around is just a series of steps that can be encapsulated into a.........button. It just takes smart coders and the will and $$$ to make it happen. Just my 2 cents for today

All of our garages up here have either straps or some form of hold down but we don’t add anything more than what the hold down requirement is which is typically two or three studs total.

The 2018 code fixes this. I just bought it in binder format and was happy to discover this. It’s not in effect yet but it’s nice to see they’re fixing things that don’t make too much sense.

It’s odd that I have to add this to my plans when no one does this around here. I just walked the dog past a home that is being replaced because it burned to the ground and here are pictures of how they’re constructing it. They must be using approved plans.

Thanks! Great explanation. The code department wants the table included (it seems I'm putting a vast amount of the code book all over my plans these days) but I wanted to understand what I was adding before I just did it.

BLUF. My plans came back with the typical additions required by the County. This one is new to me. (See attached image) I thought I knew what I was doing because I framed houses for 25 years all over from Houston, TN, GA, WA and even western Canada and was really good at it. I've never done this and it is never been pointed out to do this before on any plans. But, here it is in the code book so now I'm wondering if maybe I'm not understanding this correctly. Typically, as the opening increases in span, I would always add additional support under the header (locally these can be called anything from jack studs, trimmers, cripples, etc.) On walls that are balloon-framed two stories high, we would add additional king studs and blocking and other methods to increase the rigidity of that wall. I get that. Reduce or eliminate hinge points. As I read this code, it appears to state that I need to add additional full height studs, king studs, in accordance with the table they present. So that means every garage door opening at 16 feet or larger would require six king studs at each end (plus typically 3 cripples under the header at each end). I have never seen this done anywhere ever. I hope I'm just reading this and understanding it wrong. Let me know please. Thank you in advance. (I broke down and purchased Dragon for Mac so all of this writing is dictation (because #SiriSucks). If I failed to proofread and what I write makes no sense, I recommend just sounding out the words and maybe it will make sense. This dictation method is really amazing.)

I just joined the ICC (https://www.iccsafe.org). I bought the 2018 IRC (binder & loose leaf) and the online subscription to 2015 IRC for a year. If you have building questions, these are the folks that manage the International Code books. Many cities, counties, and states often add supplemental code requirements to address local building conditions. Like here my footings need to be only 12" below grade. Some colder places typically include a basement under the house, since the footings have to go so deep anyway. It's nice having the online access, I strongly recommend checking this option out. ICC.pdf

No regrets. All computers are similar. Since there are many more Windows-based machines there are also many more Windows-based applications, so sometimes there is an app that I can't run on my Mac (WIN only). This is typically a rare occurrence, and if / when that happens I have Parallels and VMware to emulate any operating system. Fact. A Windows-based machine will provide more hardware performance for the same amount of money that you would spend on a comparable Apple system. Fact. Anything an Apple system can do, a Windows-based system can also do. There are several things that the Apple ecosystem provides that become conveniences that I don't even notice until they're missing. Also, Apple has focused on user experience in a way that Microsoft or any other Windows-based software can't really do. I've recently collaborated on an e-book that works perfectly in iBooks, however it works terribly in all 10 of the top 10 Windows-based e-book readers. Apple has spent the time and resources to refine the products that they provide in order to make the user experience appreciably rewarding. When I was a Windows user I often had to create PowerPoint slides (because the Army can't do anything without PowerPoint) and whatever other tasks I was assigned. I found that whenever I would install software or change hardware it required me to also understand the systemwide effects that I was introducing when doing so. After many blue screens and other system catastrophes I started to look into the Apple ecosystem. I'm not so hung up anymore on having to tweak my computer to some nth degree to squeeze out every ounce of performance like I'm building a quarter-mile race car. All I want to do now is create content to the standard I set in the most efficient manner and then turn the computer off. I like how Apple manages the ecosystem so that, for me, "it just works." (I just used Dragon dictation software to speak everything here. This reminds me when I was a kid watching Battlestar Galactica and Cmdr. Adama would speak to the computer and it would type what he said. For me, this changes everything.)

Try Puget Systems. https://www.pugetsystems.com I had them build my son a massively powerful machine last September. For CAD work I would shoot for the pascal video cards. They do more precise calculations for rendering. My son's build has the 11GB 1080 Founder's GPU. It seriously blows through Ray Trace. I currently hop between a MBP and older iMac. When things need power I "rent" time on my son's machine. Wil's_Machine.pdf

I use both. I love how Chief lets me use my lone license on one machine at a time. PC or mac. X8 had issues for me back in 2015. I was collaborating with someone on a PC while I was on a mac. As we would send plan files back and forth they would often have the text files miss-located all over the plan. That didn't last too long. Fast forward to today, and I'm on X10. I can start something on a mac and then go upstairs to my son's gaming room and open it on his very expensive windows machine and everything works smoothly between both mac and Windows. For the first eight years of my computer life I was all Windows. Then in 2005 I made the switch. I like to use a computer to create content more than I want to have to learn how the internal systems of the computer work. That used to be fun. Now I just want to produce content, get paid, and be done. mac4life

Every party wall I ever framed was (2) separate walls. Some had fire-rated GWB in the 2" gap space plus sound batting 4x8 sheets. I have a sketch at the point in time in this video

Get CompressPDF app and it will shrink any PDF without noticeable quality loss https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/compress-pdf/id596412507?mt=12

Newish to Chief. AutoCAD self and formally taught. I have many details in a master DWG file and also as write blocks. I have been trying to import them into Chief with poor results. Then I thought, what if I create exact detail pages in autoCAD, print them to PDF at scale, then I could import them into CA layout and they would sit exactly on top of my layout and I could resize the "box" around the PDF to allow the title block from chief to show. Did that. Bogged down chief. Exported to PDF and the exported file took FOREVER...looked great but was 287 MB. Then (all my ideas seem to come as I'm falling asleep) I thought what about: exporting my autoCAD details to PDF displaying them at 100% taking screenshots of the details (jpg/png, whatever) dropping those screenshts into my layout Did that. Images import to fill the screen it appears. Here is what I did to fix that. A Chief Architect rookie method for importing my autoCad details as scaled images. (Framers Lead The Way!) Print to PDF all of the details that you want to import into Chief Architect (CA). Once you print to PDF open it in a PDF viewer at 100% or actual size. Actual size might be larger than your display. Drag the screen to each detail and take screen shots of them (label them accordingly) Open one of the images in an image processing app like Photoshop, or Gimp and go to image size menu to determine the pixel density of the image. On a MacBook Pro with retina display that should be 144 pixels per inch (PPI). With that information, locate your first image you want to import into CA and notice the width of that screenshot (in pixels), say its 1044 pixels. Navigate to the website called ninjaunits dot com https://www.ninjaunits.com/converters/pixels/pixels-inches/ (I searched Google for pixel to inch convertor) Check the box to the left of Activate Custom DPI. Photoshop showed that all my screenshots were 144 PPI/DPI as expected. Type 144 in the Custom DPI box. In the pixels box type in the image pixel width (the width of the first image) The website will generate Conversion to Inches in the box immediately to the right of the pixels box. For 1044 at 144PPI it displays 7.25 inches wide. Drag the image file into your Chief Architect layout. Open the file properties for the image and enter the width in the Size field. The dropped image file will resize to whatever scaled size you just printed to in PDF. **(I had originally imported the scaled PDF in its entirety and somehow it ballooned the CA-created PDF file to 287MB and bogged CA down pretty seriously so this is why I’ve tried the PNG individual file method - no idea if this actually works until I print to paper and put a scale to it.) Change image resolution from JPG 75% to 100% or to PNG. Check the box to Save image in plan. If someone has a better way please share. I tried importing the DWG file but it lost all the leaders and the hatching was all solid black The images show the process and the final screen shot of the detail in layout, printed to PDF from CA. I thought I'd post this since I couldn't find anything from Google except for a thread from 2011 on the old CA site. If this works I hope it helps. If this is bogus, then it's back to figuring out how to import things better (DWG) or redraw everything.....no fun there. Y'all take care.

Hey Jared, I'm up in Kingston. I'm new to CA. I really like it but I need to master exactly how to get it to do the things the way I used to frame. Looks like your post is a year old. Hope its been a good one for you. Mike

Great tip! Can you speak louder on the next videos?

Exactly the kind of technical knowledge I am looking for to become more proficient! Thank you for sharing!

Hey Mick Thanks for your help. This site has some really great people. I'm completely swamped and I am considering outsourcing some of the modeling work. I'll keep you in mind.

I guess I wasn't clear.....I suffer from that occasionally. The wall that is an interior-6 goes through both sides of the 12:12 roof. I need it to remain an inside wall inside the 12:12 part..........and then become a siding-6 exterior wall on the outside, but following the 12:12 roof angle (not a vertical change like in using the split wall tool) I guess this is not an automatic wall configuration? It would be nice if the software "understood" that a roof line just caused a wall to transition from an ext to int and cut the siding to match the roof pitch/ angle. I'll attach the plan, it's pretty jacked up. The client has made all kinds of changes and I think I might just start over from scratch. (I seriously need to get professionally trained) I seem to have walls or floors always blocking the stairwell .......but that's for another thread......maybe there should be a noob section........for the basic stuff that us beginners haven't mastered yet. Lot 1 Blk 4 revD.plan

Can someone direct me to the literature or video that explains how to configure a wall to have siding on the outside part but remain finished GWB on the inside part? Every time I use the painter the inside wall (in the actual model room) converts to siding. I'm hoping that there is an attic wall or something like that, that I can use along the slope of the roof to make one wall line out of two different wall types. Thank you gentlemen.

So thank you for pointing me in the right direction. I went through all dialog boxes and found that the Open Below space over the stairs had 11 7/8 inch I joists selected rather than 2 x 12 for the floor system. Now I'll now to check those defaults more closely before starting!!! Thanks again!

aha.......thanks for the time and expertise you all shared with me!!!!

And HI! back, cuz!!!

I thought I did......but I'm using 2 separate computers and keyboards......sooooooooo...looks like i selected it but didn't click the attach this file. 924SF - 2 BDRM revE.plan

Okay. I broke it. Being new to chief and being swamped with work it Is never a good combination. I have a client who wants to experiment with a very small spec home. Everything was working perfectly up until somewhere around revision C for D. Then I noticed that the ceiling above the stairwell appears to be about an inch higher than the rest of the second floor ceilings. I have no idea what I did or what setting I may have selected to cause this to happen. But now that it's present, whenever I try to auto roof things go wrong. Maybe someone here has seen this before and can steer me in the right direction. Thank you so much in advance. -- Mike from Kingston , WA

Thanks Mick!