jcogdell

Here's a spotlight lighting device rendering cheat sheet that covers the workflow. It was created a while ago so some of the Dialogues have been updated a bit since but it should still be good Spotlight Rendering Cheat Sheet.pdf

At this point the error checking only functions when the cable is first drawn, not if the light is changed. To have full control over the electrical properties of a light you need to add a consumer electrical component, this allows you to define operating voltage range, power factor, power consumption and connector. If you are happy with only changing the connector type then edit the fixtures light info record in the resource manager (right click on the symbol and select attach record), but be aware that you will need to use the universal name of the connector from the cable connector xml not the localized name. There are 2 skill videos that go through the electrical com,ponents and how to use them with different types of devices Personally I would avoid the automatic adapters and use the adapter cable parts as it is easier to get the adapter count this way. This can be done using a combination of worksheets and the new cable report command. there is a video about documenting this in the cable tool skill video series on the university The issue with cable paths at the moment is you need to carefully think about how you plan to draw your cables before you create the paths, as the automatic cable insertion options will only work with relatively simple cable path networks. Another aspect is does the cable run have to go across multiple truss line to get to the end point, if so it probably better to draw the path so that it reaches the final truss line, as this will make it more likely the cables using it will follow the desired route.

Hi Jake I had a play with your file and was able to verify that there is a problem. I'm not sure what is causing the issue though, it does seem to be specific to these specific cable path objects, as if I recreate the cable paths in a new clean file I don't get the crash to desktop. Please contact the UK tech support team to have a deeper look at your file. The main potential issues when tying to get cables to follow trusses automatically are, truss symbols from earlier versions of Spotlight that do not have the new magnets in them. The magnets define the auto-connect behavior which is also used for drawing cables. incorrectly created or corrupted truss symbols, if the truss hasn't been correctly set up to begin with or has somehow lost the data needed by auto-connect then cable will not follow the truss line automatically. The wrong mode of the cable tool is used, if schematic distributor mode is used then the cable will not follow a truss line automatically The target object is not part of the same truss system, it could be that it isn't correctly connected to the truss, or that the trusses are not part of the same system for example connected by a grapple (which is not supported by Braceworks), truss cross or a drop. Easiest way to check is to use the select system objects button in the truss properties the user has not connected the cable to the truss (by clicking on the truss) after exiting the cable path

use either the insert connection tool or the insert drops command and choose a dead-hang hoist symbol to represent a deadhang bridle. You can insert bridles and drops in 3D views.

Do you mean to hang the mothergrid? or to hang trusses from the mothergrid?

Hi @DylanvanEgmond Adding trusses to Spotlight can be done but it isn't quite as simple as just importing a DWG The thread linked below covers the basics of preparing a truss symbol, there is one step missing though as this was from before we added truss magnets in the 2022 release, so after you have finished the process in the linked thread you will need to run the update truss magnets command from the tools>utilities menu to add them and then configure them correctly inside the symbol geometry Additionally if you want your custom truss symbol to work fully with Braceworks you will need access to the manufacturers structural data to create a Braceworks cross section profile for the truss, the thread below describes how to enter this data. Please note we take no responsibility the accuracy for user created cross sections. Out of interest what truss are you trying to create? it may already be on the content teams creation list

I've managed to reproduce this and will open a bug report to get it fixed, In the meantime to avoid losing the data if you have to use the reset braceworks ID's command use a worksheet to copy and paste the distributors ID into the Name field, and after the reset copy the and paste the data back into the ID field.

Hi Dylan At this point in time its not really possible to this using structural members, This sort of structural calculation is a fairly common request and is on our list of enhancements for Braceworks in the future, but at this time I do not have any idea of a timeline for it. An existing Braceworks feature that may help is the Load overview dialogue, which you can use to get create load reports for specific parts of your rigging system.

Have you tried turning off the VGM cache in the File menu>Document settings and then changing the view to force a refresh?

Hi Greg In regards to the cables not following trusses correctly, the truss objects in your file are corrupted, again this is likely because the file was forwards ported from 21 to 22 and there were some fairly big changes to truss objects in 22. You can create new cable part libraries, styles and connectors, look on the Vectorworks university, there is a complete learning path for the new cable tools that has videos covering how to create content for the tools

Hi @DanMJ The main issue here is that Braceworks can't do any form of Ground support calculation, only suspended rigging systems can be calculated. We are looking at adding ground support calculations to Braceworks but it is still in the research phase of development at this time as it requires a complete rebuild of the Braceworks back end. Normally you could, in this example, attach extra hoists or deadhangs at the ends of the upper truss line to check that it isn't deflecting to badly, it wouldn't give you any usable data about how the ground support performs, but it would tell you whether you need any extra pickups to support the truss (like you have with the center point). However because Tomcat refuses to give us any of the structural data for their trusses that Braceworks requires, you would only see the forces acting on the truss and not how the truss reacts to those forces (whether it deflects etc...).

Hi @ELP What application is the MVR being created in? Its possible that the program exporting the original MVR is not exporting the format correctly, or that it is using the 1.2 standard, which in theory shouldn't cause a problem but may well do so since you are on 2020. The support for the GDTF 1.2 was only added in 2022 sp3, as it required us to add support for the GLTf file format, which was a fairly major project by itself. Otherwise you could try looking in the general scene description xml inside the MVR and check what the coordinates are for some of the objects, they should be in mm to 5 or 6 decimal places You will need to change the file extension to .zip to do so

Hi Drew I just did a quick check and H40V corners are losing their connection measurement definitions if they are inserted after a straight section, I'll put a bug report in to have it fixed. In the meantime you can fix the issue yourself, so that you can continue working without waiting for us insert the corner into your file and then right click on it to open the context menu select customize truss symbol data to open the Truss properties dialogue (its important to note this is not the same as the truss properties in the OIP shape pane) in the right hand geometry pane of the dialogue look at the L1, L2, etc fields and make sure these are correctly filled in, the diagram shows what each measurement should be for example for the H40V-C003 corner (the standard 90° corner) L1, L2 and L3 should have 406mm in them. hit Ok to confirm the changes and exit the dialogue Auto-connect will now work correctly so you don't have to do this again save the updated corner symbol into a favorites, user or workgroup library for future projects. Look in the 52V library, It looks like the library folder has a typo in the name. I'll get a bug report in for it.

Sorry but I don't have progress or news to report about this at the moment, I'll pass the extra info onto the developers and see if i can find anything out

Hi Matteo Thanks for the feedback, I'll add it into our developers system. If it helps the new cable tools skill video's are now available on the Vectorworks university, https://university.vectorworks.net/ Gruße Jesse