Elevation - merged components issue

[Russ@Summit]

I'm running into an issue making elevations, and I can't find a solution. I had it solved at one point, but no idea how it was solved, or how I messed it up.

I have discovered, and been told, that to show elevations with 2D hatches I have to make a section cut outside the building and render that section cut as an unshaded polygon. Then I can annotate that section cut with details I want.

Then, there's this magic button for merging similar materials so adjacent walls with a different construction, but the same exterior finish (say a 4" stud wall with brick veneer, or a 6" stud wall with brick veneer) will merge to "look" like one... if they are aligned properly. Right now, this doesn't happen for me... either when they are walls on the same level but different construction, or exact same wall types of different levels.

The wall construction is pretty basic, there are only 2 components, the studs, and the sheathing (which I apply a hatch that looks like siding, as we don't show sheathing on the plan, so when it shows up in elevation, it looks like siding). It has this issue regardless of the wall construction as it appears with a brick or a stone veneer.

Thanks for your help.

[CipesDesign]

The only suggestion I have is to make certain (100% certain) that all of the walls in question are PRECISELY aligned with each other in plan and from top of lower to bottom of upper, and that walls are joined at intersections...

[Dieter @ DWorks]

I have discovered, and been told, that to show elevations with 2D hatches I have to make a section cut outside the building and render that section cut as an unshaded polygon. Then I can annotate that section cut with details I want.

Then, there's this magic button for merging similar materials

That's only for the section part of the section viewport. The things behind the section will not be merged. I always use a section viewport for my elevation, but not because of what you say, but because of all the terrain and garden stuff I don't want to see, plus it gives a nice ground poly.

For your lines, make sure everything is aligned. Even if they look aligned, they can be misaligned! To be sure, first drag the wall way beyond the wall above/below, then move it back to where it needs to be. VW doesn't really do small distances well. So as a general rule: move it back, then move it to the correct spot.

If you still have problems, please post the file so we can look at it.

[Russ@Summit]

Thanks Peter... I have made as certain as I possibly can to get them precisely aligned. I have viewed them in plan, and in 3D. I have set the units to go to 1/64th, and tried dimensioning them from a static datum point I use. I've deleted and re-created them using the other walls as snap points. I've changed the heights to make them be mis-matched and then matched again in various formats (height of wall to ceiling, then adding the floor structure size, height to be finish floor above).

I've tried everything... I spent most of yesterday... I'm about to bandaid the problem with an annotation.

[CipesDesign]

Yes, band-aid it. Sometimes it's just not worth the trouble to fight with it. Or if you can post the file here one of us might have time to take a quick look. p

[Russ@Summit]

That's only for the section part of the section viewport. The things behind the section will not be merged. I always use a section viewport for my elevation, but not because of what you say, but because of all the terrain and garden stuff I don't want to see, plus it gives a nice ground poly.

For your lines, make sure everything is aligned. Even if they look aligned, they can be misaligned! To be sure, first drag the wall way beyond the wall above/below, then move it back to where it needs to be. VW doesn't really do small distances well. So as a general rule: move it back, then move it to the correct spot.

If you still have problems, please post the file so we can look at it.

I am gone to such extreme measures to be sure they are aligned, it's nuts.

If it infact doesn't work to blend the finish materials beyond the section line, then is there another way to make an elevation which uses a 2D hatch pattern, and not a texture? I've read everything, and the look of the section is what I'm after, but I just want these lines to merge.

[CipesDesign]

The only way that I am aware of is to annotate it. Maybe I'm missing something too. Maybe others know??

[Russ@Summit]

Well... I've come up with a solution... it's a bit of a hack, but it works. In the wall type I put a layer called Brick Elevation (or whatever the material is), give it a thickness of .0000001, a hatch pattern of the brick I want, and a pen of none. I class it as Wall-Component-Elevation finish.

Now when I change the wall type in my plans, it shows up as how I want it hatched in the plan, and how I want it hatched in the elevation... without patching/band-aiding/hacking together some annotations to make it work. So now when a customer changes from our standard siding to brick veneer... it'll populate the whole set of documents with the single change on the plans.

It works, and pretty darn well... just wish I didn't have to do it that way. It's going to be a bit of a pain when the software gets updated to handle this automagically and I have to fix my walls.

[mike m oz]

Russ, can you please post an example file containing a wall and a Sheet Layer Section Viewport demonstrating your method.

[Russ@Summit]

Here's a wall with it's construction, and a viewport on a sheet showing both plan and elevation.

Works pretty well if you ask me.

[mike m oz]

Nifty.

[VincentCuclair]

That might be the workaround of the century Russ even for many an experienced user too! Thanks

[Russ@Summit]

Really? Does that come with a medal?

[Guest Wes Gardner]

Keep in mind, it appears that you are rendering in "Unshaded Polygons" as your rendering style for your viewports. Is that an issue?

[VincentCuclair]

Really? Does that come with a medal?

:grin: what will you do with a medal? Better to be asking for beer, money, free VWs licenses etc....

[Russ@Summit]

Keep in mind, it appears that you are rendering in "Unshaded Polygons" as your rendering style for your viewports. Is that an issue?

That's the only way I can get the 2D hatch to show up. I tried every other way....

I do what I call a "hybrid annotation" which is more complicated than I want, but I don't have time just yet to learn how to get roofs and such to work correctly. So I draw elevations around the house, and then make viewports for those in elevation. So, there are two viewports for each elevation (actually, 4... but two viewports are just to change between slabs and crawl spaces with a single class selection)... Annotations might work better, but this way I can make other options easier and keep them accurate to the plans properly.

[Guest Wes Gardner]

Russ,

Hey, if you can get it to produce the elevations in the style that you need, then it looks like you're good to go!

Wes

[VincentCuclair]

Well... I've come up with a solution... it's a bit of a hack, but it works. In the wall type I put a layer called Brick Elevation (or whatever the material is), give it a thickness of .0000001, a hatch pattern of the brick I want, and a pen of none. I class it as Wall-Component-Elevation finish.

Now when I change the wall type in my plans, it shows up as how I want it hatched in the plan, and how I want it hatched in the elevation... without patching/band-aiding/hacking together some annotations to make it work. So now when a customer changes from our standard siding to brick veneer... it'll populate the whole set of documents with the single change on the plans.

It works, and pretty darn well... just wish I didn't have to do it that way. It's going to be a bit of a pain when the software gets updated to handle this automagically and I have to fix my walls.

There is a way to avoid this extra component by using wall component class hatches and class hatch overrides in the SLVP. see attached example, the walls on the right are created in this way......

Edited April 13, 2013 by Vincent C

[Dieter @ DWorks]

Looks nice and a good way to produce black/white drawings, but there seems to be a problem with the lines. They look behind the fill, which looks wrong, very strange.

Edit: Seems I didn't had show line thickness on....

Pity it renders the with the wall class and not the actual component, you now have to have extra classes, each for each type of exterior component if you want this,....

Edited April 13, 2013 by DWorks

[VincentCuclair]

Yeah, you know it made me wonder if class hierarchies could be embedded in an object somehow so that we could reduce the number of 'main' classes, (I'll soon have over 300 classes 2/3 of which are to ensure my workflow functions as I need....... )

Doesn't export to dwg either......

[Dieter @ DWorks]

I'll soon have over 300 classes 2/3 of which are to ensure my workflow functions as I need.......

Here are almost 400 classes, just to get the flexibility and ease of workflows VW can provide. All my objects' attributes are always set by class, so I never have to use the attributes palette, and that is such a great thing because you have all the control over your drawing, all the time.

Only if VW could have two fills for each class, one for the section and one for the surface, then I could delete a lot of classes, because mostly I have duplicates because you need and the section fill and the surface fill for some objects!

Edited April 14, 2013 by DWorks

[gester]

hey guys, can you please provide the vw2012 versions of the testfiles?

thx, rob

[VincentCuclair]

....

[Jonathan Pickup]

Well... I've come up with a solution... it's a bit of a hack, but it works. In the wall type I put a layer called Brick Elevation (or whatever the material is), give it a thickness of .0000001, a hatch pattern of the brick I want, and a pen of none. I class it as Wall-Component-Elevation finish.

As somebody pointed out, you have to set your rendering options to shaded or unshaded polygons for this to work. Unfortunately, this means that it doesn't work in perspective, but it does look good in a straight elevation.

I tried not to use your extra wall component. Instead, I use class overrides in my elevation viewports to assign the hatch that I wanted to the various walls.

[Assembly]

Class over ride is how I do it. This can cut down significantly on the classes.

I have learnt is to spend a lot of time making a single Section View port work. Over ride all classess, get all wall components looking correct.

There is a trick to creating new section VP's.

1) Duplicate the Section VP

2) Change the Item number of the new VP

3) Click on section line instance button, turn on a view of the section line instance. (I have a standard VP dataname: SECTION KEY)

4) Edit the viewport annotation to move the section line.

BANG perfect new section based on previous.