MarkM1965

OK, I just played around with this some more and there does seem to be some rocket science behind the issue I am having because here is what I found. If you draw the rectangle addition and add roof and ceiling planes than add the trusses and view the truss in the truss detail viewer the trusses are perfect. Now in my case the addition is a 6" step down from the existing house finished floor and the addition has an 8 foot ceiling height so the ceiling height does not match the existing house (so floor and ceiling in the proposed addition is a 6" step down from existing). Once I put the 6" step down, my trusses are messed up. So how do I fix this or is this a glitch in the CA-X7 program? Thanks for your help, Mark

Thank you Shane K. for posting your plan of the fixed trusses, but what did you do differently from what I did to get the trusses to work? I would really like to fix the original design so the trusses work, I do not want to have to redraw it as I have too much time invested in the design, all the interior details are designed it is a completed addition. My problem is that now it is time to make construction drawings and would like to fix my original instead of a redraw. Please tell me what you did or what I need to do to fix my original design. Thanks for your help, Mark

Hi, Hopefully yo can help me out with this as I have no idea what the issue is with what I am designing. I am designing an addition onto an existing house, I create the roof plane and the ceiling plane but when I use the truss tool, the truss seems to be off center a little bit, not the peak but the ends that sit on the walls. In my attached drawing you will see 3 designs. The "original design" is the addition design and if you look at the truss in the "open truss detail" you will see that it is not a mirror image of the other side. The "test design #1" I drew off to the side to see if something was wrong with the original design so all the dims are correct to original, created roof planes and ceiling planes and again if you look at the truss you will see that it is not a mirror image to the other side. The "test design #2" is just a random dimension rectangle I drew, created roof planes and ceiling planes, and guess what, if you look at the truss in the truss detail you will see that both side are a mirror image. Now why is my original design and test design #1 not working but test design #2 is? What do you think is wrong with my original design and the test design #1? I appreciate any help that I can get on this as the client is looking for these drawings and I have been playing with this for a few days now. Thanks for all your help, Mark Chief Architect X7 MCCNAMARA-junk.plan

Thank you so much for that video lesson, that helped me out A LOT as I am a visual learner. Sorry I didn't explain the entire proposed addition as to what I was looking for, but you covered everything and learned some new things. Yes the 2nd floor is the entire 1st floor foot print, but matching the Cape Cod style of the existing house. The proposed door in the existing house, 2nd floor is a problem as it obviously will not work so going to client tomorrow to discuss possibilities for design. I subscribed to your youtube channel for more info on using CA. I have been using CA since 2008, but basically for small garage additions, porches, decks, small additions, etc. nothing too complicated. This is my first proposed 2 story addition connected to an existing house. Usually the additions are 1 floor or on the existing 2nd floor, so this is a first for me. Thanks again for your help, Mark

Hi, I thought I had it figured out, but I am still having issues manually building a 2nd floor on a proposed addition. I have the existing house (Cape Cod) drawn already using the build floor command, but now have to build a 2nd floor on proposed addition and have to do it manually because the build floor command wants to build a 3rd floor since I already built the 2nd floor on the existing house. Problem I am having is after drawing the exterior walls (for the 2nd floor) on the proposed addition, I cannot select inside the walls to create rooms. What am I doing wrong??? I am attaching the Chief Arch. X7 file so you can see what I am designing and possibly figure out what I am doing wrong. I wouldn't mind CA building 1st and 2nd floors on both existing and proposed but I want to provide about 3 different scenarios for the client and do not want to have to redraw the existing house every time. Thanks for your help, Mark SCHULER ADDITION PLAN.plan

Sorry, maybe I didn't explain my scenario clearly enough. What I have is an existing house (Cape Cod style), and the client wants to add a Cape Cod style addition attached to the left of the house consisting of an enclosed area and a 2 car garage on the first floor. On the second floor of the addition (over the garage and enclosed area) will be 2 bedrooms and a full bath. I have attached screen shots of my project, both plan and 3D. Existing house is on the right, proposed addition is on the left. I have already created the existing house all floors complete, next I want to create about 3 different options for the client to choose for their addition. So what I wanted to know is how to create a new 2nd floor on the proposed addition without disturbing the already created 2nd floor of the existing house. AndyGump's suggestion worked fine with drawing in the 2nd floor manually instead of having CA create it, since that is impossible with a 2nd floor already created on the existing house. For some reason drawing the 2nd floor manually earlier today was not working for me and thought I was doing something wrong. It is working now for whatever reason and I appreciate the help and suggestions. Thanks, Mark

Never mind, I just tried it again and now it seems to be working. Don't know what I was doing earlier today, but the just could get that 2nd floor manually drawn in. Thanks for your help, Mark

OK, I have done that, but than I can not get the area to highlight and name it a specific room. What am I doing wrong at that point? I thought it would work just like the 1st floor but no matter how many interior walls I put in, it won't let me select inside the created area.

Hi, Hope someone can help me out with this problem. I have already drawn in my existing house (Cape Cod), now I am drawing the proposed addition onto the existing house. After drawing the 1st floor of the proposed addition I need to create the 2nd floor, but when using the "build floor" icon, CA wants to build a 3rd floor since I already have a 2nd floor on the existing house. Is there anyway possible to create the 2nd floor on the proposed without affecting the already finished 2nd floor on the existing? I want to propose a few different scenarios for the addition and do not want to create the 2nd floor on the existing house each time. I am using CA-X7 Thanks for your help, Mark

I tried changing the color of the wall in the object viewer material options and it did not make the color any closer to the color shown in the color palette. I removed all the lights I had in the office area and started playing with spot lights positioned at the corners of the office. 150w spot lights pointed at the wall still did not produce the color shown in the color palette. So I just started playing with the "Adjust Material Definition" command and I can get the color close to what i want this way, but a lot of work playing with the red, green and blue numbers along with the hue, saturation and luminecense. For now I will just keep testing different options and see what works best and most cost effective so i am not spending a ton of time creating colors. Thanks for all the help, Mark

OK, thanks for the info. I will reduce the number of lights and see what effect that has. Next I will remove the spray painted walls, then select the wall, open object and change the color in the material option. I will post my results. Thanks, Mark

Thanks for the quick response, but I have (40) 4 foot flourescent lights in the ceiling and all are on (light data = spot light, 2850 lumens (150w), 0 tilt angle, 0 direction angle, 180 deg cut off angle, 1.0 drop off rate, use in both camera and ray trace). Something else I maybe doing wrong? Thanks, Mark

Hi, Hopefully someone can help me out. I am working on a project for a client to show different interior color scenarios for their office. The problem I am having is when I select a color from the color palette and put that color on the wall, when I view the room in the floor camera view the color is way off (not even close). Example: in the attached image the color picked form the color palette is "cloud", once selected I painted the walls in my drawing with that same color. You can see how completely different they are. What am I doing wrong? How do I get the color to display the same as in the color palette? Thanks for you help, Mark