Connecting base cabinets

[Chris Rogers]

I have a room that I would like to have a U shaped base cabinet around three sides. Can I simply insert three base cabinets and tell them to merge with each other?

[CipesDesign]

No, however there is a "corner" configuration which can be used along with straight cabinets. And if you want you could group them all together so that they move, rotate, etc., as one unit.

[Kool Aid]

I have a room that I would like to have a U shaped base cabinet around three sides. Can I simply insert three base cabinets and tell them to merge with each other?

Can you tell the cabinet-maker to do the same? Apologies for my flippancy, but there are real-world considerations involved. I'd rather have a corner cabinet arrangement, unless we're talking about a small space, of ?hostess kitchen? size.

It is a pity that there appears to be no facility to create a single, combination-wise arbitrary, bench-top from two or more base cabinets. I wonder if InteriorCAD has such functionality and if, what is the (quite demanding) user-interface like.

Furthermore, I wonder how one makes an island bench for a kitchen with this integrated product.

Finally: not that I would limit the use of base cabinets to kitchens. Not even wall cabinets!

[Chris Rogers]

I am very early in schematics and don't want to be sidetracked with the details of how many cabinets and where the joints are. I simply need to show a very complex monolithic plane that wraps three sides of the room then goes through a cased opening to create a multilevel countertop on the other side of the wall. I assume the best bet is to revert to plain 3D modeling and lose all the parametric functionality?

[brudgers]

My advice:

Progressive refinement.

Make 3d solids of simple forms for now.

Place it a class like "casework-generic"

Turn it into a symbol.

Model actual cabinets at the point you need more complexity.

Place actual cabinets in a class like "caswork-actual."

Add them to your symbol.

Then you can model both ways as needed and control presentation with classes.

[CipesDesign]

Hi Chris, the easiest (and probably best) way to show a "monolithic plane" (ie: the line of the counter top) is to 1) draw the shape in 2d using rectangles, polygons, whatever; 2) select the shape and run the "Floor" command, using settings appropriate for a counter top (eg: base height= 34.5"/thickness=1.5"). There are a lot of nice things about Floor objects including a) they are 2d/3d hybrid objects which can be colored or textured; b) you can use the "add surface" and "clip surface" commands on them to very quickly modify their shape(s) in 2d; c) Later in the design process you can continue to use the floor-as-counter top by inserting the base cabinets beneath it and unchecking the "create counter top" box in the cabinet PIO's. Happy New Year ;-)

[Jonathan Pickup]

i would do as peter suggests, i have done it this way several times

[Chris Rogers]

Thanks for the help, guys. This is my first project with VW and I am learning as I go.

[Kool Aid]

Chris,

It seems I answered to an unasked question! The workflow suggested by Peter Cipes is the one I use at the schematic stage, too. I definitely don't want to be sidetracked by the complexities of parametric objects or symbols. Not even my own objects?

Modeling a complex, non-standard kitchen may well be easier with the ?basic? tools: floors, walls and the like. In my experience, the cabinet-makers will anyway make their own working drawings. (For better or worse: one clever guy did not ask me why the units were split as they were. Well, that was based the maximum size that could be actually brought in?)