jcaia Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 I'm trying to figure out why if I set a design layer wall height that isn't setting my wall height. I've even set the wall data tab "Top Bound" to "Layer Wall Height" and it makes no difference. I feel like in the past I could control the wall heights without setting up stories....but this isn't working as I remember. Thanks for any help. Quote Link to comment
jcaia Posted September 24, 2020 Author Share Posted September 24, 2020 OK, adding more to the mystery for me - the process i've used works fine (setting wall height), except when i start with a styled wall. How does a wall style change my ability to set wall heights? 1 Quote Link to comment
Jeff Prince Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 @jcaia a wall style can be configured to have a height, which takes precedence over your design layer settings. Quote Link to comment
jcaia Posted September 24, 2020 Author Share Posted September 24, 2020 Just now, jeff prince said: @jcaia a wall style can be configured to have a height, which takes precedence over your design layer settings. Thanks Jeff! If you see my insert options part of this is confusing me since i've set (what i believe to be) the correct info for shaping the wall to my layer wall height. However, its not changing the wall to match. Quote Link to comment
Jeff Prince Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 (edited) Here’s a fun exercise for you.... Open a new document, create two design layers Set the wall height of one to 2 m and the other to 20 m, name appropriately Select the wall tool and change change the settings on the “insertion options” tab to top bound = layer wall height and bottom bound to layer elevation as you have shown in your example. Leave this wall as ‘unstyled’. Now make your 2m design layer active and draw a wall using the unstylish wall. It will be set to 2m tall based on the wall tool preferences. Move that wall to the 20m design layer and it will increase in height to 20m. Now, select that wall and change it from unstylish to one of the VWX wall styles (not the story bound ones). The wall will drop down to the height associated with that wall style breaking it’s relationship with the design layer wall height. Similarly, discretely entering wall heights in the OIP will break the relatiopnship with the design layer wall height because in each case, you are specifying more detail that takes precedence over the design layer wall height. The relationship with the design layer wall height can be restored by selecting the offending wall and changing it’s Top Bound back to Layer Wall Height (it changes once you apply a style), but oddly it will keep the discrete height you gave it, do some Vectorworks magic math, and come up with entirely new wall heights that are not related to the wall style or design layer height. Truly good stuff indeed. Make sense? Edited September 24, 2020 by jeff prince 2 Quote Link to comment
Pat Stanford Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 Make sure you select the Wall Styles that are not set to use Story data and you might be happier. The Wall Styles that use Story data is called Bounded. Walls that do not use Story data are called Fixed Height. Quote Link to comment
E|FA Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 (edited) You might want to take a look at this: There is a basic decision that needs to be made when you set up your file - using stories or not. I've decided that for my work (primarily custom single family homes) I'm much better off going with the "no stories" system. While you lose some automation, for me it's much easier to set up. It also handles split levels and double height spaces better. Edited September 24, 2020 by E|FA typo Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 8 hours ago, jcaia said: If you see my insert options part of this is confusing me You can control the top and bottom heights of a Wall (Style) for the overall Wall as you did in your screenshot. But you can also set/overwrite top+bottom for each Wall Component. I think this is the case in your Style. That way the overall Wall height settings will be ignored. Wall Styles and Story+Level in VW are a bit complicated at first (IMHO more than it needs to be) But once understood and set pretty helpful. Quote Link to comment
jcaia Posted October 1, 2020 Author Share Posted October 1, 2020 On 9/23/2020 at 5:43 PM, jeff prince said: Here’s a fun exercise for you.... Open a new document, create two design layers Set the wall height of one to 2 m and the other to 20 m, name appropriately Select the wall tool and change change the settings on the “insertion options” tab to top bound = layer wall height and bottom bound to layer elevation as you have shown in your example. Leave this wall as ‘unstyled’. Now make your 2m design layer active and draw a wall using the unstylish wall. It will be set to 2m tall based on the wall tool preferences. Move that wall to the 20m design layer and it will increase in height to 20m. Now, select that wall and change it from unstylish to one of the VWX wall styles (not the story bound ones). The wall will drop down to the height associated with that wall style breaking it’s relationship with the design layer wall height. Similarly, discretely entering wall heights in the OIP will break the relatiopnship with the design layer wall height because in each case, you are specifying more detail that takes precedence over the design layer wall height. The relationship with the design layer wall height can be restored by selecting the offending wall and changing it’s Top Bound back to Layer Wall Height (it changes once you apply a style), but oddly it will keep the discrete height you gave it, do some Vectorworks magic math, and come up with entirely new wall heights that are not related to the wall style or design layer height. Truly good stuff indeed. Make sense? Sorry for the belated response. So I did what you asked and it was interesting. The results don't match what I figured would happen. I made 2 design layers - (1) 10' and the other (2) 20' (im in ft not m) When I setup the layer structure as you said, drawing an unstyled wall on the 10' layer gives me 20' in reality, and moving it to the 20' layer gave me a 30' wall. Is that what you expected? I've placed some screen shots to show (did i miss something?) Quote Link to comment
Tom W. Posted October 2, 2020 Share Posted October 2, 2020 You want the top offset in the O.I.P. set to zero not 10'. You're in effect adding 10' to the layer wall height hence increasing it from 10' to 20' 1 Quote Link to comment
Guest Wes Gardner Posted October 2, 2020 Share Posted October 2, 2020 @jcaia, you may want to head over to the Architect section and read the two articles posted near the top - "Model Set-Up" and "No Stories, No Problem". They fairly carefully cover the difference between a Level Bound wall style and a Layer Bound wall style. There are a couple of study models you can experiment with as well. Cheers! Wes Quote Link to comment
Jeff Prince Posted October 2, 2020 Share Posted October 2, 2020 @jcaia Sorry, looks like I forgot to mention setting the top offset to 0 when setting up the initial wall style. by having the top and bottom bounds set to your layer wall height and layer elevation respectively, with a top offset of 0, you get a wall that is sized to those constraints. 1 Quote Link to comment
jcaia Posted October 3, 2020 Author Share Posted October 3, 2020 Thank you everyone....I will check out that "Model Set-Up" and "No Stories, No Problem" article. However, I am so curious why styled walls act so radically different than un-styled walls...? I'll see if that article holds the answer. Quote Link to comment
Jeff Prince Posted October 4, 2020 Share Posted October 4, 2020 @jcaia looks like you selected a story bound wall style in that example. wall style components can be set to take their characteristics from the layers, stories, or direct input. This is why they seem to misbehave, you have to know what is in the style in order to predict the behavior. 1 Quote Link to comment
Tom W. Posted October 4, 2020 Share Posted October 4, 2020 Hi @jcaia to illustrate what Jeff says if you look at the settings for the particular wall style you're using you'll see that its overall height and the heights of its components are set to be bound relative to story. To make this particular wall behave the way you want in the first instance you need to change top bound to 'Layer Wall Height' + bottom bound to 'Layer Elevation'. And in the second instance select all four components + click on Edit... + change 'Relative to Story' to 'Relative to Wall'. Then it will respond to what is shown in the O.I.P. You just happen to have chosen a story-bound wall which is why it's behaving this way. In a way you might be better starting with a blank canvas + creating a wall from scratch, then you can ensure it's set up exactly how you want it rather than editing an existing one which can be confusing. I'd treat the VW walls/slabs/roofs more as samples/examples of what you can do rather than resources you'd actually seek to build a full model from. It all goes back to what @E|FA said earlier about making a decision at the beginning as to how you want to set up your document. The simplest way is to have no wall height at all set on your design layers + to set the top + bottom wall bounding to 'Layer Elevation' + then just control the height by the Top Offset value. This will be a value added to the layer elevation so in effect becomes the height of the wall. The other end of the scale is to use stories which has many advantages but is more complex to set up. It depends on what you're doing + what you need. For example, if you have a single story building + you know what the wall height will be from the outset + it's never going to change, then probably v little advantage to using stories. 2 Quote Link to comment
Pat Stanford Posted October 4, 2020 Share Posted October 4, 2020 Unless you are using Stories, and are using the default Wall Styles that ship with VW, make sure you select Walls from the Imperial Fixed Height Walls or Metric Fixed Height Walls rather than the Story Bounded versions and you will be much happier. You can make either work, but it is just easier if you don't fight stories if you don't need them. 1 Quote Link to comment
jcaia Posted October 5, 2020 Author Share Posted October 5, 2020 On 10/4/2020 at 12:49 AM, Tom W. said: The simplest way is to have no wall height at all set on your design layers + to set the top + bottom wall bounding to 'Layer Elevation' + then just control the height by the Top Offset value. This will be a value added to the layer elevation so in effect becomes the height of the wall. The other end of the scale is to use stories which has many advantages but is more complex to set up. It depends on what you're doing + what you need. For example, if you have a single story building + you know what the wall height will be from the outset + it's never going to change, then probably v little advantage to using stories. Thank you again everyone for the help. This section of advice was very helpful. 1 Quote Link to comment
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