Stories help....

[Andrew Cass]

Doing my first real design of a house and I have a spot where I'd like to use Story bounds for a wall and I keep getting a pop up error that doesn't make any sense to me.   I have 3 stories, Basement, Ground level and Top Story.  When I go to apply the Ceiling level type to the design layer labeled 3-Roof it gives me this pop up saying "Level Type is invalid" and that its already in use by another level in story "Top Story" but the thing is its not.  You can see by the screen shot that the other design layers are on different stories and different level types.   I've tried deleting the story and starting over with fresh layers and nothing seems to fix it.  Any help is appreciated.  

[E|FA]

I don't want to derail the thread, but have you compared using Stories vs not using Stories?  They are two distinct workflows and all of the Wall Styles have to be set up accordingly.  If you have made the decision that Stories will work well for the type of work you do, I'll let someone else help.  I do mostly single family residential projects, occasionally with split floor levels, and found Stories to be more of a hassle than a benefit.  If I was doing midrise or highrise buildings I would probably choose differently.

 

https://forum.vectorworks.net/index.php?/topic/63744-no-stories-no-problem/

 

[Andrew Cass]

1 minute ago, E|FA said:

I don't want to derail the thread, but have you compared using Stories vs not using Stories?  They are two distinct workflows and all of the Wall Styles have to be set up accordingly.  If you have made the decision that Stories will work well for the type of work you do, I'll let someone else help.  I do mostly single family residential projects, occasionally with split floor levels, and found Stories to be more of a hassle than a benefit.  If I was doing midrise or highrise buildings I would probably choose differently.

 

https://forum.vectorworks.net/index.php?/topic/63744-no-stories-no-problem/

 

I feel like stories was made exactly for this reason but maybe I'm wrong.  In this case I need a wall to be limited by the story above thats not a flat surface (The Roof) .   As shown in the attached photo.  So how would I do that without using stories?

[Tom W.]

1 hour ago, Andrew Cass said:

  In this case I need a wall to be limited by the story above thats not a flat surface (The Roof) .   As shown in the attached photo.  So how would I do that without using stories?

 

Do you mean you want to shape the top of the Wall to fit the underside of the pitched Roof...? 

[Andrew Cass]

16 minutes ago, Tom W. said:

 

Do you mean you want to shape the top of the Wall to fit the underside of the pitched Roof...? 

Yes Tom that is what I mean.

[Tom W.]

2 minutes ago, Andrew Cass said:

Yes Tom that is what I mean.

 

For this you either need to use the AEC > Fit Walls to Objects... command or manually shape it using the Edit Wall too. 

 

Whether you bind the top of a Wall to a Story level or to the Layer Wall Height or set its height manually as an offset of the Layer Elevation you're essentially doing the same thing: they are just three different ways of setting the height of a Wall. In all three cases you'd still need to use Fit Walls or the Edit Wall tool if you wanted to reshape the top (or bottom) of a Wall.

[Andrew Cass]

2 minutes ago, Tom W. said:

 

For this you either need to use the AEC > Fit Walls to Objects... command or manually shape it using the Edit Wall too. 

 

Whether you bind the top of a Wall to a Story level or to the Layer Wall Height or set its height manually as an offset of the Layer Elevation you're essentially doing the same thing: they are just three different ways of setting the height of a Wall. In all three cases you'd still need to use Fit Walls or the Edit Wall tool if you wanted to reshape the top (or bottom) of a Wall.

Got it.  thanks Tom   I tried the edit wall tool but it wasn't working as I was hoping but I'll go back and watch some videos and see what I missed.   

[Tom W.]

I would say Fit Walls to Objects should be your first port of call for something like this. If it doesn't work for some reason you can then tweak the results with Edit Wall.

[E|FA]

@Andrew Cass If most of your work is small scale, I would recommend at taking a closer look at the layer bound workflow before you go too far down the road.  You can build the same models with both workflows, but one method may be better.for different project types and management personalities.  

[Tom W.]

One of the benefits of using Stories is the enhanced functionality you get from Elevation Benchmarks which you don't get with a layer-bound set-up. I don't currently use Stories myself but for this reason intend trying them out soon...

[E|FA]

I'm sure there are many benefits and they're very useful.  I got totally frustrated trying to model a house with multiple floor intermediate floor levels, and found it much easier to ditch the Stories.  I also found the interface managing Levels too confusing.  There's only so much I can handle.  If I make changes to my workflow, it will be to try to use Materials.

Edited February 27 by E|FA

[Flair-Studio]

I recently started modelling with stories and a tip I could share is once you have set up your buliding model using stories, to immediately make a separate template file out of it, including the wall styles you have created. That should be a good base to make things easier for your next projects.

Apart from the elevation benchmarks there are other advantages (i.e. control over floor, slab, false ceiling height, aligining objects (ceiling fixtures, railing, etc) to certain heights and more