8 replies to this topic

[Salvatore Valente]

I have a side by side duplex plan where there is a 2' elevation change from left side to right side, but both sides of the plan are the exact same.  I have done a mirror down the middle of what I have drawn and shifted the new side of the plan 2' towards the back, but is there a way to also raise one side of the building up by 2'?  I want to tell softplan to break at the middle point of the two plans so that they move independently of each other. See photos below.

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[Gary McKeon]

You have to put everything on one side or the other on different levels. That way Softplan knows to differentiate between the two sides

[Salvatore Valente]

Hi Gary, thank you for the reply! How do I mass assign a level to all of one side? Also I was hoping I had figured out the solution by putting a concrete floor slab system under each floor plan instead of on a foundation plan and adjusting the level on each side, but the walls do not shift with the slab level.  Is there an explanation as to why the walls don't reference the floor system they are sitting on?

[Mark Petri]

Use floor levels for each floor system. The higher floor system, for instance, should be set to Level 2 and 24" offset. Do that for each drawing level and floor system in the higher duplex. Then, you may have to go through and either check clean up for the whole drawing or just the walls and everything else that references those floor systems or edit what you need to offset properly.

[Mark Petri]

If you want to make it offset quickly on it's own, you could take the one side of the duplex and save it to it's own folder and use it as a neighborhood house, then set the offset that way. It will not allow you to do a good cleanup between sides or adjust anything on the neighborhood house (side) in the host house (side) though. So, some trade-offs.

[Salvatore Valente]

Hi Mark, I guess my overall question is do the walls reference the floor system that is on their drawing or do the reference the top of the foundation walls that they are stacked on in the model.  These are slab on grade and currently I have the slab floor drawn on the foundation drawing, which pretty much means there is no floor system in the first floor drawing.  Should I switch that so the slab is on the first floor drawing and eliminate it from the foundation? Also you say do that for each "Drawing Level"  where is that function? The only place I see to assign a level is under the floor system tab.

[Salvatore Valente]

Nevermid on the "drawing level" part of that response, I now realize you mean 1st, 2nd, etc. but I'm still curious about what level the floor system should be on.

[Henry Buckner]

Your right hand unit contains the reference point so make that slab level 1. Edit the left hand slab, make it level 2 and set the offset to 24" down. Go back to the floor plan

drawing and press Ctrl/C (cleanup) The walls should adjust to the proper offset. If they don't, set the offsets for the left-hand walls to the proper level.

[Mark Petri]

If you don't want to reference or do not have a floor on a level of the model that is fine. It all depends on what you use to stack the model, but the general rule of thumb is to keep the lowest walls on the model the base point and adjust everything up from there. So, if the left side is the lower side and you have a 3'-0" foundation wall, the right side walls would offset 2'-0" so the top of the right side foundation would be 5'-0". The slab on the left would be offset to 2'-8" and your slab floor for the right side (assuming 4" slab set flush with top of foundation walls) would be offset 4'-8". Then, the next level (drawing level, model level) would have the walls on the left at 0'-0" and the walls on the right at 2'-0" offset.

 

Then, the walls of the upper level (let's assume a 2x10 joist and 3/4" subfloor) on the left side would automatically offset to 10" (assuming they correctly cleaned up to the floor system). And, the floor system on the right side should be set to Level 2 or whatever level is different than the left side (really doesn't matter as long as it is different) and the joists should be offset to 2'-0" and subfloor should offset to 2'-9.25". Then, the walls on that side ought to reference that right side subfloor and offset to 2'10" whereas the left side walls ought to be offset at 10".

 

Clear as mud?