Sloping block terrain questions

[Nick29]

Hi there,

 

I've recently purchased quite a steep sloping block of residential land and using Chief Architect to design our new home. I'm not a professional my intent is to provide a builder with a floor plan that they can then use a starting point. I have some specific requirements and with the nature of the block I really need to visualise what it will look like and see what will and won't work, taking into considerations costs for the slab, retaining, steepness of driveway etc.

 

I've watched a number of videos but what I'm not grasping is the overall process for designing on a sloping block. I want to work with the land, and this will mean that the ground floor will be across two possibly three levels with the upper floor on one single level.

 

I have imported the survey DWG with the contours, defined the terrain perimeter, marked the setbacks and drawn the walls. I'm thinking to position the garage and utility room around a meter lower than the rest of the ground floor to reduce the incline of the driveway

 

My questions:

1) Should I use the 'Flat Region (Cut/Fill)' tool for creating the slabs? I don't see a way to adjust the height i.e the depth of the cut?

2) How should I adjust the height of the garage and utility room on the ground floor so I have the short stairs going up to the entrance?

 

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

Regards,

 

Nick

(Premier X13)

[glennw]

1.

As you have discovered, there is no control available for the terrain Modifiers.

I never use the modifier tools.

Use the Elevation Data tools instead - especially the Elevation Region tool.

You can then draw flat areas at various shapes and specified heights and Chief will grade the terrain between the Elevation Regions.

 

2.

Select the rooms, open their dbx and change their floor/ceiling heights.

[SH_Canada]

29 minutes ago, glennw said:

Use the Elevation Data tools instead - especially the Elevation Region tool.

i do as well around the house so the corners are where you want them to be when you build the house. in the case of a garage, that elevation across the garage would be the same, so a region in front should work.

 

I also use elevation lines where fixed points are known across the entire structure.

 

IMHO there is a difference between what the surveyor has today, and what it will be when you build the house. some points will be built up and some may be excavated to order to get what one wants

 

for instance there is a county here which makes us plot as surveyed, and as proposed markers, and then there are rules on how much of a difference they can be

 

 

[Nick29]

Thanks.

 

I've created three regions but I'm seeing odd spikes how do I smooth this out?

 

I initially tried to create regions within the terrain perimeter as I want to add retaining on the side and back but that created some bizarre results.

 

I think the regions are snapped in with the red 'x'. What am I doing wrong?

 

[glennw]

Don't overlap elevation data.

I give my elevation regions a light transparent fill - different color for each different height.

That makes it easier to keep track of things.

Post the plan

[Nick29]

Thanks Glenn, I've attached the plan zipped so it doesn't exceed the size limit.

 

I've tried to include another elevated region at the back as well for the stepped retaining but getting the same issue.

 

 

Draft v0.1.zip

[glennw]

I always draw the terrain larger than the plot and then draw the plot as a thin Terrain Feature- this gives room to move around the outside of the plot.

Quote

Don't overlap elevation data.

 

You have a lot of Elevation Lines on the DTM_DTM-01_contours layer.

They are running through the elevation regions which causes a lot of conflict.

You need to break/edit/delete the elevation lines so they don't run through any Elevation Regions.

You really can't show existing and finished levels on the one terrain model.

 

[Mark3D]

Have a look at this file i found your elevation data put it on correct layer made it standout blue you will see you have elevation lines ontop of elevation regions chief needs no overlap at all 

 

Glenn beat me with this anyway the file may help you so i will leave it there

Draft v0.1mark.zip

[glennw]

You also have a Flat Region floating out in space.

 

 

[Mark3D]

I had a very rough go at it to get you started, its rough around the edges but they will get better with terrain breaks and retaining walls, have a look at the file it should point you in the right direction

Draft v0.1terrain.zip

[Michael_Gia]

I’m no terrain guru so I cheat at it. 
 

I use a terrain feature (with a negative value) to cut a clean rectangular/polygonal hole that includes my driveway and walkway and stairs leading to the front door.

I’ll even go past these points to include areas that need to be “resculpted” by the excavation contractor.  
Then I draw in my exterior stairs and landings at the required height. 
For the driveway I’ll use a polyline solid and shape it as necessary. This way I can determine the slope from a cross section. 
For the parts of the land that need to be resculpted I’ll again use various polyline solids to indicate sloped sections.  They won’t be pretty and smooth but they’ll at least give definite outlines and elevations to follow as a guide. I leave the smoothing to the excavator. 
 

It’s quick and dirty but it works. You can go mad trying to get elevation regions to do what you want. 
 

If you really want to smoothen out your p-solids you can export them to Sketchup, smooth them out there and re-import them. 

[Nick29]

Thank you so much for taking the time to fix that up Mark that's a great starting point for me, very much appreciated.

 

Looking at the plan I can understand what you were saying Glenn about not having lines running through regions.

 

Thanks Michael for your advice too I'll see how this goes with the driveway.

 

Out of interest looking at the DTM layer are the intersections the points where the elevations where taken during the survey?

 

 

 

 

[Mark3D]

6 hours ago, Nick29 said:

Thank you so much for taking the time to fix that up Mark that's a great starting point for me, very much appreciated.

 

Looking at the plan I can understand what you were saying Glenn about not having lines running through regions.

 

Thanks Michael for your advice too I'll see how this goes with the driveway.

 

Out of interest looking at the DTM layer are the intersections the points where the elevations where taken during the survey?

 

 

 

 

Out of interest looking at the DTM layer are the intersections the points where the elevations where taken during the survey?

yes i put those lines on chiefs elevation data layer and made them blue gave them a thick line weight so you would see them plus i broke them so they would not overlap elevation regions

Its is really good to have them standout when trouble shooting crazy terrain results