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Clarify the Protocol for Designing & Joining Multi-Component Walls


CiaMariaPia

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Three Items:

 

1)     We would benefit from better technical resources to explain the best way to construct multi-component walls.  This would include more clarity about how the choice of components influences how wall intersections clean up.  For example, the concept of the "core" of the wall being an important component for wall joins is hinted at but I've struggled to find out how to define the "core" - it's not a characteristic that's mentioned in words in VW materials but not illustrated graphically nor apparent in the wall style dialog (I'm still looking).

 

2)     I would appreciate better technical resources explaining how to join more complicated multi-component walls.  Currently, the VW examples and tutorials deal with fairly elementary walls and wall intersection conditions.  In reality, buildings are far more complicated.  Current VW technical support lacks a set of recognized, reasonably fool-proof protocols/procedures for joining these walls in ways to reflect the manner in which the walls will be built.  Users are left to a trial and error process of finding wall joins that reflect reality .... and then sometimes those solutions seem to be unstable and disappear when the file is re-opened.  The recent/ongoing discussion on the Service Select Forum illustrates this problem.

 

3)    In a related topic, there are currently "L"-join and "T"-join tools for wall intersections ,,,, but there's no tool for joining two walls that align with each other.  This is not that big a a problem when using "unstyled" walls that are the same thickness and are only single-component walls (In this case you generally don't need to use two separate walls anyway).  However, when the two walls are not the same thickness and/or don't use the same components, "joining" them so that they "look" correct on the printed sheet is tough/impossible.  This gets even more complicated with working with a "T" configuration and each leg of the "T" is composed of a different wall style utilizing different components/thickness/finishes.

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As to the wall core, please see below:

 

image.thumb.png.5f2caf603d906bffcb33dcc71b7d6b6f.png

 

12 minutes ago, CiaMariaPia said:

3)    In a related topic, there are currently "L"-join and "T"-join tools for wall intersections ,,,, but there's no tool for joining two walls that align with each other. 

 

The whole process of wall joining is a bit of a hit and miss. Aligned end-to-end walls can be joined with L-join, however, even if they are of the same style, they remain as two separate walls really, which is odd and plays havoc with windows and possible later changes.

 

13 minutes ago, CiaMariaPia said:

Users are left to a trial and error process of finding wall joins that reflect reality .... and then sometimes those solutions seem to be unstable and disappear when the file is re-opened. 

Do you refer to known issues occurring with project sharing, or does this happen even without it?

 

In general, I very much agree with the above post. The wall joins are "production-critical" for an architect and it's not enough that the final drawing is "about right" - it has to be 100% correct, and the process has to be predictable. Especially since we are supposed to be doing BIM reflecting the real building. Still too often I find the component joins won't obey for no apparent logical reason. There is much room for improvement here and this particular issue is a very important one. The building cannot be presented the way the program wants it, rather how it's going to built, of course.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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JMR -   You and I obviously see this issue the same way:  predictable, understandable and real-world-based wall cleanups are a fundamental need, not only for BIM but just for simple rendering/viewing.  I'm not doing any "project sharing" so that evolution isn't on my radar and does not drive my thinking on this issue.  For me the issue is simply that it takes a lot of time and patience to create a drawing that properly reflects the building AND "looks" good to contractors and clients (who are becoming increasingly sophisticated).  Wall joins and cleanup should not be a separate, cosmetic task that you do at the end of the drawing process but rather a part of the thinking/design process that occurs - and gets revised - without great difficulty easily along the way because those details guide the development of the building.  Coming from the AutoCad world, this was an issue I conquered quite a while ago and for which AutoCad was pretty transparent about the "how" and "why" it worked the way it did.  I like Vectorworks but this issue is a constant puzzle.

 

....and thanks for pointing out the "core" column, I was looking within the component itself for some type of flag to set.  You pointed out that you need to back up sometimes and look at the forest.  Thank you.

 

Tom

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