9 replies to this topic

[Neil Paquette]

Good Afternoon,

 

I am re-approaching a subject I brought up this past May.  A topic that was dutifully answered by other forum users.  Helped out big time.

 

http://softplan.com/...gle-elevations/

 

Well a slightly simpler job has come up, but still at a 30° angle.   When it came time to generate elevations, under the 'Camera' tab, I used 'Look at Surface'.  This gave me a straight on view of the angle.   From here I generated a Softplan Drawing.     When working on the final elevation many of the dimensions, and by many I mean all, seemed to be off.   Did it a few more times and the same thing happened.  I did notice after some time, (an afternoon.) the proportion of the errors were the same.  I found that If I reduced the elevation drawing by a scale of 0.866, things were corrected. 

 

So now that I have a free afternoon, I tried  a quick test to see if it was a consistent thing.  And yes it is.  I have  attached a zip file of my litmus test.  

 

Just curious to see if anyone else has had this issue and what else they may have done to correct it other than reducing the scale of the drawing.

 

Thanks, 

 

Neil Paquette

 

P.S.  And yes Mr. Softplan guy, I have sent a ticket in to tech support.

 

 

 

 

[Mark Petri]

Your elevations typically will show the siding surfaces, which I suspect are in the correct position relative to the framing per your wall definitions. Also, your roofing will be offset by the thickness of your sheathing and roofing material settings. Often SP will also produce some fractional errors with angles and how corners align. So, it may make sense to check what he actual dimensions are minus the thicknesses of your wall materials outside of studs (assuming plans are dimensioned to face of studs).

[Keith Almond]

That doesn't do it Mark ...

 

On a 20' wall (which isn't large) scaling at 0.866 gives an error of over 32", so there's more going on than just finishes.

[Neil Paquette]

Thanks guys for the quick response.    

 

I did try discounting the finishes.   But then I started checking my dimensions on the foundation walls which have no finishes on them.  The width of the foundation of the front gable wall is 10'0" wide & 8'1" high.   After generating the elevation using the method I described, the wall is 11' 6-9/16" wide and 9' 4" high.   

 

A quick run through of the math: 

• 10' 0" ÷ 11' 6-9/16" = 0.866
• 8' 1" ÷  9' 4" = 0.866

 

So this shows me it is applying to all axis.

[Dennis Hilborn]

I tried to duplicate your experience.

1. in 3d view look at angled wall straight on using the "look at" tool.  This zooms way in on the building.

2. zoom out to see the whole building.

3. Save drawing as SP drawing.

4.  Now the view I am looking at, if dimensioned is out of scale.  My model has a 40 wall angled at 30 deg.  It dimensions 112' 4 11/16 in the saved drawing.

Another one generated the same way but zoomed differently dimensions 73'-6".

 

I believe this is because the scale drawing generated is governed by the zoom of the view it was generated from.

If #'s 1-4 are not what you did then, never mind.

[Keith Almond]

The zoom shouldn't affect the Softplan drawing. I'm not at a Softplan Computer, but can you try a couple of different zoom scales and see if that affects the generated drawing?

[Dennis Hilborn]

The zoom shouldn't affect the Softplan drawing. I'm not at a Softplan Computer, but can you try a couple of different zoom scales and see if that affects the generated drawing?

I agree, but I believe it does.  I may not be using the same technique as the original post, but I believe that I am using a valid one.  And getting drawings that are not anywhere to scale.  I did use two different zooms and got two differently scaled drawings.

I wonder what my excuse should be if I turned something like this in?

[Philip Frank]

Why not just create the elevation using the section tool. First thing I do is go to my "Cursor Option" and, choose "Pick Cursor Axis". Then click on something in the plan view that is parallel to the elevation. Now draw your section line away from the building and ensuring that the ends of the section lines extend beyond the ends of the building. Now generate the section making sure the "Background" option is checked. Finally save the generated section as a .SoftPlan drawing. Using this method creates elevations with the proper dimensions. Once the elevations are created I delete the section lines from the plan drawings

[Dennis Hilborn]

Why not just create the elevation using the section tool. First thing I do is go to my "Cursor Option" and, choose "Pick Cursor Axis". Then click on something in the plan view that is parallel to the elevation. Now draw your section line away from the building and ensuring that the ends of the section lines extend beyond the ends of the building. Now generate the section making sure the "Background" option is checked. Finally save the generated section as a .SoftPlan drawing. Using this method creates elevations with the proper dimensions. Once the elevations are created I delete the section lines from the plan drawings

That's the way I have been doing it.  But there are others who have been doing it this other way that seems to be creating out of scale drawings without knowing it.

[Neil Paquette]

Looks like using the section tool is the way to go.   However does SP have any intentions of correcting this?

 

Thanks all for those who helped out.   Much appreciated!!!