Is Vectorworks EVER going to get wall clean-up right?

[billtheia]

We keep hearing about how great VW BIM is but it STILL can't handle wall clean-up properly.

A very typical condition is to have a 4-way intersection of walls with differing thicknesses. No matter what I do, I can't get it to clean-up all four intersections. At least one is always not cleaned up.

WTF?

How hard can this be?

Am I doing something wrong?

See attached pic.

[Dieter @ DWorks]

You just can't do this with L-joins. Verticals need to be joined at their ends, then T-join the horizontal walls to the top vertical wall. It should do the trick.

[billtheia]

I know that L-joins won't work. Your suggestion won't work, DWorks because the top and left walls are thicker than the bottom and right walls - I wind up with gaps or overhanging lines.

I tried L-joining the top and left walls and then T-joining the bottom and right walls to those. The result is pictured above.

[ionw]

billtheia, it took me a little fiddling, but Deiter's directions do work.

what I did was to heal the wall breaks.

pull the wall ends back so none of the 4 walls touch. select the two horizontal walls and the upper vertical wall and use the align vertical with the bottom option selected.

use the wall join tool in L-join mode and click on the bottom vertical wall first and join it to the upper vertical wall.

change the tool to T-mode and then click on the right horizontal wall and join it to the upper vertical wall

click on the left horizontal wall and join it to the same

voila you should have something like the attached

[starling75]

L join + 2x Tjoin

[billtheia]

Thanks, Ion. With your help, I got it to work. I would never have thought to use an L-join between two collinear walls. It took some gymnastics, though. I got the 4-way intersection to work but then an intersection at the other end of one of those walls broke. I fixed that and then one of the original 4-way walls broke. I was able to fix that and now everything is clean. I still think that the whole thing doesn't work very well. Wall clean-up seems to operate based on some set of rules that just doesn't make any sense to me.

Starling, your example only looks like it worked. If you turn on line thickness, you'll see that one of the walls isn't cleaned up.

[starling75]

Starling, your example only looks like it worked. If you turn on line thickness, you'll see that one of the walls isn't cleaned up.

Indeed it wasn't cleaned up, but it was my fault ...

Now it's ok.

[billtheia]

Hmmm. You DID get it to work. I can't get it to work in VW2012. I wonder if something has changed since VW2009 (the version that it appears you are using.)

[starling75]

Hmmm. You DID get it to work. I can't get it to work in VW2012. I wonder if something has changed since VW2009 (the version that it appears you are using.)

Yes 2009

From what I saw 2012 should handle wall connections better.

[billtheia]

I thought it should too but I have yet to see any improvement.

[VincentCuclair]

I would never have thought to use an L-join between two collinear walls.

The tool icon is perhaps slightly misleading in this regard, see it more as the joining of 2 wall ends be them at an angle or collinear......it also works for joining a straight and curved wall for example.

[VincentCuclair]

Hmmm. You DID get it to work. I can't get it to work in VW2012. I wonder if something has changed since VW2009 (the version that it appears you are using.)

Another important thing to know is once you have joined the walls and they don't show correctly you need to start over completely......move all wall ends back, then remove any 'history' they retain by using the Remove Wall Breaks tool and then do the above.

[starling75]

Hmmm. You DID get it to work. I can't get it to work in VW2012. I wonder if something has changed since VW2009 (the version that it appears you are using.)

Another important thing to know is once you have joined the walls and they don't show correctly you need to start over completely......move all wall ends back, then remove any 'history' they retain by using the Remove Wall Breaks tool and then do the above.

I usually use point split tool to detach and then delete "corrupted" wall ends... clean amputation

[ionw]

It is also important that the walls are aligned properly, regardless of the method. sounds stupid to recommend, but this isn't one of those places where close is good enough.

Glad I could help.

[Bob Holtzmann]

I think in this instance, the Pillar command would be very useful. It's as if this command were made for this very situation.

[billtheia]

Where has that tool been all my life?

I didn't even know it was there. Worked like a charm.

Still, would rather wall cleanup be more straightforward and able to handle more complex (and common) conditions.

For now, though, looks like the Pillar command will be my solution of choice.

Thanks, Bob.

[Dieter @ DWorks]

Where has that tool been all my life?

I didn't even know it was there. Worked like a charm.

Still, would rather wall cleanup be more straightforward and able to handle more complex (and common) conditions.

For now, though, looks like the Pillar command will be my solution of choice.

Thanks, Bob.

Keep in mind that by doing this, you can't bound slabs to the walls and pillar!

This kind of situations are perfectly doable with walls like described in my post at the top.

[atari2600]

Not to mention it's still letting the "tail wag the dog" when it comes to joining a few walls. It is sad that we are still dealing with workarounds on a tool that's been in the software for as long as it has....

[D Wood]

There may be a problem with needing to have different textures on the pillar sides.