How to get a custom cupola or roof item to sit on roof?

[LegacyChief]

I'm currently using x12. I place a lot of custom cupola on building designs. My issue is that I'm trying to get the custom cupola to land on the roof when I drop it in the plan. Right now it always lands on the floor. Then I have to see what the ridge height is and adjust it's placement etc...

 

I found this tutorial from 2015 that looked like what I needed, however when I'm converting the cupola to a symbol as shown in the tutorial the option for 'sits on roof' is not available as shown in the tutorial. 

 

Tutorial I'm referring to:

https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-01042/creating-a-symbol-that-sits-on-the-roof.html

 

Does anyone know where the 'sits on roof' option went or what the new method is to get a custom item to sit on the roof by default?

 

Just fyi I created the cupola from polyline solids in a plan of it's own before grouping it and saving it to the library.

 

Thanks in advance.

[Joe_Carrick]

Look in the Object dbx under "Options"

[Alaskan_Son]

5 minutes ago, LegacyChief said:

Does anyone know where the 'sits on roof' option went or what the new method is to get a custom item to sit on the roof by default?

 

There is no longer a "Sits on Roof" option in the Symbol Specification dialog.  Instead, Chief added the option to the Object Specification dialog (as Joe mentioned above while I was typing this up)...

 

[LegacyChief]

Thanks guys! 

 

So, by testing I find that I still have to:

1. Place the object
2. Open the dialogue and set the 'Elevation Reference' in the general tab to 'From Roof'
3. Set 'Roof to Bottom' to 0"

This works but, is there anyway to have it automatically drop into the plan on the roof? I tried going back to the original plan where I created the cupola, grouping the items and opening the dialogue to set it as you suggested before I convert it to symbol but it's totally different options there:

 

I double checked and the original pieces I used to create the custom cupola was a combination of soffits, cad defaults and exterior fixtures. Could this be the issue?

 

 

[Joe_Carrick]

Open the "Object dbx" of your Library Object and set it to "Sits on Roof".  That way, when you place one from the Library it will work automatically.

[LegacyChief]

18 minutes ago, solver said:

 

Why before? You want to create a symbol, then change the symbol as shown above.

 

Hi Eric,

 

Thanks for your reply.  In trying to solve the issue myself, I tried to specify the elevation reference before I converted it to a symbol in hopes it would land on the roof when inserted into another plan. The option wasn't there and that didn't work for me.

[LegacyChief]

29 minutes ago, Joe_Carrick said:

Open the "Object dbx" of your Library Object and set it to "Sits on Roof".  That way, when you place one from the Library it will work automatically.

Joe,

 

Thanks so much. This was the fix. I had some trouble finding what "Object DBX" was because I wasn't familiar with that term.

 

Basically I found the item in the Library Browser and right clicked it. From there I had the option to open the object and set the elevation reference. After this, it's working great!

 

Also, I had to leave the "Flush Mounted" unselected or it would angle sideways flush with the roof plane instead of sitting squarely on the roof apex.

 

Thanks so much guys!