Ability to place doors and windows in angled walls ?

[Kevin K]

I realize I am probably dreaming to expect this to be included in a future VW version, but it would be quite the time saver.

I have designed several Projects that include angled walls.  Meaning they are not perpendicular to the ground plane.  They have  a slight angle.  It becomes a royal pain to place doors and windows within this scenario.  I know this is a bit outside the box and that not many structures/residences would employ this particular design element.

I ( hopefully) attached an example of what I am referring to. A residence I recently designed.

[zoomer]

And how did you do it for now,

Wall Projections for Wall's angles + Custom Windows in Symbols attached to them,

or is everything custom Solid Modeling ?

[Kevin K]

Zoomer

1) I created the basic tapered shapes using 'tapered extrude' tool.

2) Then used the 'shell' tool to hollow out the solid object.

3) created solid extrusions where the openings are then 'solid subtracted' to punch holes on the basic object.

4) created the windows I wanted, then had to 'ungroup' them, then rotated that group to fit the angle/opening

as I said....a royal pain.

 

Bet you are sorry you asked  🙂

[zoomer]

Oh I see.

That's a non standard Situation where VW BIM Comfort ends.

But at least nearly all things are doable with custom Geometry and BIM tagging.

Edited October 26, 2018 by zoomer

[Kevin K]

Yeah, no comfort at all  🙂

No worries....Just putting it out there.

[DavidK]

I do have the same wall conditions in my project. I wish there is a way to convert the  “sloped 3D solids”into walls. 

[Kevin K]

David K, I feel your pain  :-)

Perhaps by 2030 they will implement this feature.

We can only hope  

[KIT KOLLMEYER]

@Kevin K I’m wondering if you have found a better solution to this issue. I’m about to start an A-frame house project.

[Kevin K]

Hey Kit

No, sadly I have not found another approach to easily putting doors and windows into sloped walls.

Certainly there are other methods besides my solution to achieving this, that exist, so have at it if you find another way.

 

[Kevin K]

One slightly different approach would be to NOT actually angle the doors and windows within the walls, but rather create your basic A-Frame structure,  then use the wall tool to create small sections of vertical walls within the openings, then place doors and windows into those wall sections.

I was considering that as an option when I was designing that residence I referenced in the earlier post. Mainly because it was a heck of a lot easier than actually angling the doors and windows.

 

Note the doors and windows in the shingled portion of the image attached. I was experimenting with using a shingled exterior in that particular design as opposed to stucco.
 

[KIT KOLLMEYER]

Ooooh, that's a good idea. Thanks Kevin.

[Kevin K]

Well....it would make your life a lot easier. :-)

Feel free to get on touch if you need any thoughts on creating the basic overall A-frame structure.

Happy to help.

[Benson Shaw]

have not attempted this, but would this go a ways on the path?.....

roof faces instead of walls and customized skylights for doos and windows? 

-B

[Kevin K]

 Benson

Interesting approach.  Have you actually attempted this?

If so, I, and probably others, would be keen to know the results of your efforts.

[Benson Shaw]

no but might be worth a shot. no time right now but will try to look into it. seems mansard roofs can be formed this way. maybe something tricky with a zero depth dormer would add to the fun. design wise a question would be whether to make vertical windows or slope them. sloped doors would be a bit strange, like a hatch. 

[Kevin K]

Benson

I had some free time to experiment a bit with your creative  thoughts regarding using the roof tool to create angled walls, and then placing windows on an angle into those walls by making them symbols, then skylight objects.

The take-away regarding this approach is that it worked pretty darn well except for one exception, which kinda ruined everything :-(

 

When attempting to use that paradigm to cut a hole in an angled roof, to accept an area where you would want to place a door (in a vertical wall and NOT on the angled roof surface) using the skylight technique, it was impossible to cut that subtracted area from the base of the roof object. It just would not allow it, sadly.  It would always leave a tiny strip of the roof edge.  IF you made the distance zero from the bottom edge of the roof, it simply would not cut the hole.

Sorry, kind of hard to articulate this. at least this was my experience.

I did check with the tech guys at VW to have them confirm that it was, in fact, not possible.. 

 

That said, for any window symbols that became skylights positioned anywhere but the bottom edge of the roof, it worked like a charm.

So...bottom line....in the end, I had to revert to using boolean subtraction techniques, converting the roof objects into roof faces, then punching holes where I needed to. I suppose if one was ok with having a door placed on an angle ( sort of like like a hatch, as you had mentioned) it would all work, but in reality I don't think the hatch-door thing is all that desirable for a residence.

 

Note the attached exterior rendering, which was the result of my little experiment. 

All in all, it was a fun ride. :-)

 

[Benson Shaw]

@Kevin K - Soo, couple of things:

1. Wow!  Really cool design and fantastic rendering.  Is that RW? or Lumion? or?

2. Great that you worked through this and discovered features and  faults!

3. This is total workaround city, but regarding a vertical door at edge of roof face.  Would it work to place the drawing in TopPlan and cut a notch in the roof face (remove the bottom edge), then create the door wall and triangular cheek walls? Needs a bit of math or 3d guide objects  so that the roof cut matches the desired height for the door wall. This at least keeps all the vwx smart objects without resorting to solid subtractions.

 

My problems with this include that I don't work with walls that much, and don't like working with vwx mitred wall joins at those intersections of triangle to flat topped walls, so unjoin and adjust lengths, remove mitres, or draw new unjoined or . . .  Plus how to represent the intersection at top of door wall with the sloped roof wall. Bury it in the roof? Stop at the lower edge of roof opening and model a filler soffit? Or?  Framing choices ill defined.

 

-B

 

[Kevin K]

Benson

The rendering was done with RW but I used an HDRI background which really fills in the overall look, as opposed to just having the building sitting in white space. For somewhat better renderings I export the VW file to Cinema 4d and Vray which is sort of of like RW on steroids, especially for interior renderings!   :-) But, for this exercise RW was more than adequate to use.

Responding to something you alluded to in your last post, cutting a chunk out of the roof object does absolutely work, but.....the down side with that is that if you need to slightly modify the part you are removing you are dead in the water. You would need start from scratch and create the roof object again. Unlike the Roof Face tool, which can be mended if the part you have added or subtracted needs to be modified, for whatever reason. It would really be helpful if the roof object tool could work in that same manner. 

Anyway...as I prattle on, just for grins,  I attached one interior rendered view of the main living area of that design.  The house feature a central kitchen theme and all the other areas, living, dining, media and home office areas are all housed within that same large space. Probably a bit too eclectic for the average person but I am intrigued with the concept. All the other areas, bedrooms, library, laundry, etc of the residence are accessed from the main living area.

Wayyyyy to much info, I am sure. :-) That said, you can see from the rendering there is a lot of 'architectural drama' in that main space whit all the high ceilings and clerestory windows, etc.

 

K.

 

living to kitchen view.pdf