Chief With Sketchup Extensions

[CARMELHILL]

I never tried this, maybe someone else knows....how much of the original manipulation of original Sketchup items remain after they are imported into Chief?

 

I'll try it at the office on Tuesday, just thought I would post the question here for some Sunday afteroon, below 1degree F, thniking...brrrr.

 

Yesterday I was looking at Sketchup Pro and saw two extensions that would be tremendously helpful in lite commercial work. They have an HVAC ductwork extension and an Engineering piping extension.

 

If you import a few symbols made in Sketchup with these extensions do you still think you can manipulate them in Cheif, or would you have to do the whole design in Sketchup and then import the finished piping layout into Chief as an end product? I hate having to switch back and forth for EVERY revision.

 

 

[Alaskan_Son]

Definitely have to switch back and forth. Once importing into Chief all you have is a simple 3D symbol. Essentially the only real edits you can make to it are naming, sizing, and material changes.

I would encourage you to find another method inside Chief instead. Where there's a will, there's usually a way.

[Kiwideziner]

just a thought, for piping type thing maybe stretch planes??

[GerryT]

i have little experience with 3Skeng but some. I regard it as one of the best piping/hvac plug-ins out there outside of Bentley/ Microstation. i don't think it is practical to bring in a Skecthup design other than as a separate view, as the bounding box would be too large to work with and you can not break up the Sketchup components as it is then just one symbol. It would be nice if you could do a overlay with a transparent background but don't know it that is possible. You could bring in the individual components from Sketchup and build a library in Chief, but then you would have the same problems that Chief's spiral piping has. Symbols have no snap points in Chief so if you get off the grid, it is very difficult to align them, particularly in 3D. And Chief has been totally close minded about listening to problems in this area, so don't look for any relief.

 

Yes, it can be done, but don't believe you could ever be competitive trying in Chief. Stick with Sketchup -- IMNOHO.

 

And for you Ruby nay Sayers, 3Skeng is written in Ruby as a standard ruby plug-in, so it's a good indication of what is possible if Chief would only extend ruby and open up data access in Chief. OTOH- take a look at 3Skeng's pricing structure -- it's a "killer".

[johnny]

You can scale and add stretch planes to SU resources, but you can't manipulate shapes like you do inside SU.  Everything that comes into CA from SU is basically a symbol.

 

Having worked with other HVAC and fire system designers who use SU, the power of semi-intelligent symbols and resources inside SU is key.  CA currently doesn't have anything that could even be setup to work like that.

[Alaskan_Son]

You can scale and add stretch planes to SU resources, but you can't manipulate shapes like you do inside SU. Everything that comes into CA from SU is basically a symbol.

Having worked with other HVAC and fire system designers who use SU, the power of semi-intelligent symbols and resources inside SU is key. CA currently doesn't have anything that could even be setup to work like that.

That's not exactly true. Granted, it wouldn't be as automated, but there are a lot of possible replacement methods using 3D moulding polylines and even polyline solids. Definitely not as automated or intelligent, but doable.

[johnny]

That's not exactly true. Granted, it wouldn't be as automated, but there are a lot of possible replacement methods using 3D moulding polylines and even polyline solids. Definitely not as automated or intelligent, but doable.

 

I guess I didn't illustrate what I meant.  Here is a quick vid of what i've seen some of the people I work with do inside SU for this type of work.  SU has a semi-intelligent symbol system that allows tools (extensions) to be developed.  From what i've seen in CA I can't see a way to make symbols behave like this....Maybe someone can and I dont know, but i've never seen scripting control symbols in CA.

 

[Rich_Winsor]

This definitely falls in the "Where there's a will,

there's usually a way." category, but I was able

to plumb my well model using some pipe fittings

from imported SU along with Chief's Polyline

Shapes. The model and Ray Traces were all

done completely within Chief.

 

BTW, Chief has a HVAC catalog available in the

3D Library you might want to check out (before

they decide it's a specialty niche and want to

charge you for it).  

[CARMELHILL]

It's already specialty.....it's spiral duct. 

[yusuf-333]

This definitely falls in the "Where there's a will,

there's usually a way." category, but I was able

to plumb my well model using some pipe fittings

from imported SU along with Chief's Polyline

Shapes. The model and Ray Traces were all

done completely within Chief.

 

BTW, Chief has a HVAC catalog available in the

3D Library you might want to check out (before

they decide it's a specialty niche and want to

charge you for it).  

Rich, that is really interesting. Thanks for sharing.

[Rich_Winsor]

Thanks Yusuf. Funny you should mention interesting.

I have been reading portions of the Kebra Nagast.

Wow! Talk about interesting. Our history talks about

some guy riding around on a horse saying the British

are coming. Your history talks about the Queen of

Sheba shacking up with King Solomon and having a

kid who steals the Arc of the Covenant and takes it

back to Abyssinia/Ethiopia.

 

BTW, what have you guys done with the Arc?