Best way to show two different buildings in same set of construction documents.

[Ed_Orum]

This client has two buildings on the same property; they are detached. 

The first is the residence, the second is the pool house. There is a 12' difference in the elevations of the floors. (main house 0-0, pool house -12'-0)

Should I open a new plan for the pool house, then send it to the same layout as the residence or is there a better method?

Thanks in advance.

Lane

[TeaTime]

There's been other posts on this sort of topic, and you'll get a few different options from different people here, since there are several techniques that are personally preferred and or are fairly situational.

 

You can simply create the pool house with a floor -12' from the plan's origins and keep the two structures together. This makes planning Terrain and keeping dimensions all consistent, etc.  But if there's significant differences in plan Defaults, it can be helpful to draw them in separate plans.

 

The seemingly unpopular feature that I personally like it the ability to draw two entirely different plans, then use Reference Display to join them together. There are Offsets with the reference display that allow you to shift the referenced plan, rotate it, even change its elevation.  It's not a perfect tool, though, the biggest downside is that you have to set it on every view necessary.

 

Another technique some might suggest is still creating two separate plans, but then for 3D Views you can convert one structure into a 3D Symbol and just plop it into the other plan.

[DavidJPotter]

I either just draw one plan file in the case of just two structures changing the settings as necessary.

 

When I have had large projects I created a .plan file for each building, then convert that model into a symbol to show the entire project of multiple buildings and using the individual .plan files for con docs.

 

DJP

IMAGES MADE IN X1

[robdyck]

1 hour ago, TeaTime said:

The seemingly unpopular feature that I personally like it the ability to draw two entirely different plans, then use Reference Display to join them together. There are Offsets with the reference display that allow you to shift the referenced plan, rotate it, even change its elevation.

This is how I handle it as well. Always a separate plan file for each building. There are plenty of reasons, here are a few:

• easily use your exterior elevation cameras (which of course already exist in each plan with all sorts of frequently used text, and other cad items)
• easily conform to your layout template
• maintain the correct '0' elevation for the main floor of each building. This helps keep the building elevations intuitive for you as you draw and for your con. docs.
• easily re-use and modify the plan file for the accessory building

[Ed_Orum]

Thanks!  I have never used the Reference Display to join them together, but it like it's time I learned how to do it.