LakeTravis

Thought I'd add a view of google earth with my zigzag pattern on it that creates the elevation points. zigzag.pdf

Thought I'd share a technique I've used for generating a site plan with topology lines. Maybe someone has an even better way which I'd like to hear as well. My goal was to generate a site plan for a 10 acre lot. Something we could use to show where the house should be, where the drive should go, where some features should be. In order to do this, I really needed to import topology into Home Designer (I use HD Architectural). Here's what I did. I had the boundary of the 10 acres plotted in Google Earth. I then created a criss-crossing herringbone pattern throughout the entire site using the path tool making sure to have points in every corner and along every edge as well as up and down throughout the plot. All told, I probably created about 150 path points. Make sure not to join the ends otherwise it doesn't work for some reason. Once the points have been added, I'd export the project from google earth as a .kml file. I called this the 'elevation' view. I then did the same thing except rather than create points throughout the interior, I simply created points along the perimeter. Again, being sure not to join the path together or it doesn't work. I exported that as a 'perimeter' view. Now I used a tool like: kml2gpx.com to convert this kml file to a gpx file. So end up with one gpx for perimeter, and one for elevation. Here's where HD has some quirks. HD allows you to import gps data but it only allows you to do it once. So, first time around I imported the perimeter. It's best to do this on a new project. I wasn't ever able to move my house plan to the correct location in the site plan so I just didn't bother. When importing gps data, HD asks whether it's perimeter or elevation. Select perimeter. The view will then have a nice outline of your lot. The view will have north as vertical. Now here's the quirk. Since I can't import the elevation once I've imported the perimeter, what I do is copy the site perimeter to the clipboard and then select the undo button until we are back before the import. Now I do another import of gps data, this time selecting the elevation gpx file and specifying elevation. Once it is imported, I then go to "Terrain" -> "Build Terrain". Voila, I now have all my contour lines on the plan. I then paste the clipboard and my lot outline is added. Now save it away so you don't have to do it all again. I'm not sure why I couldn't import both gpx views but I tried for a while and just couldn't get it to work without generating the perimeter first and cutting/pasting it into the elevation view. HD get's a little unstable after this. I think because there ends up being a lot of elevation points. But it's not too bad. I've attached a pdf of the result. Would love to hear if anyone has a better way of doing this. LoganBranchN24c.pdf

I understand, but getting a dealer to price stuff means we are closer to building it than we actually are. Instead I'm just going through google and picking a high end price for estimates per square foot of slab, framing, etc. etc. Surely my estimate this way a) is a lot of work, b) is probably less accurate than a default price list. Maybe Home Designer could have sample price lists for country or region. I don't know. But I get it. It doesn't do it. And if I'm really curious, I can try to estimate it myself. I was just making sure that I wasn't missing something like, "oh, just download this file from the chiefarchitect site. Thanks everyone.

Yeah, Just for ballpark. It would be great to click a button and the tool comes back and says, "blah blah, these prices are simply estimates and may not reflect the actual costs you may find from your suppliers. These estimates do not include labor and other costs which can run anywhere from 40% to 100% more, blah blah". I just want a guess-timate.

Thanks all, but not particularly helpful. I've read the reference manual. And that wasn't particularly helpful either. I get it, I can export the material list to a text file, and import it into excel. Yes, presumably there are third party estimation software but there's no recommendations. So, although it's possible, it's beyond the scope of this forum. So, I'll just leave it there.

I have a floor plan and decided to see if I could get an estimate of the material cost. When I bring up the material list, all the items have a 0 price. I understand that there ae a lot of variables to price and probably no estimates would be 100% accurate. But I was hoping that there would be an initial price list already entered and I could get an estimate +/- probably 80-100% but still, I'd like to have some idea. Is there such a download of sample prices or must I go through and try to estimate each item myself.

Thanks David. And I understand that. I am new to this and I now have what I have. I am trying to figure out whether I can fix what I have or whether I need to reenter it. I believe I probably have to reenter it. But I'm looking for confirmation. I see you are from Austin. So am I. I also see you are a teacher/tutor. I'll send you email

I've updated my signature. I've searched all the available places. I'm very good at searching the web for answers and usually answer all my questions that way. There is one post I saw somewhere that said, try not to do what I've done (that is, created a house plan that was not horizontal). I know that now. So my question is, can I make it horizontal or do I have to start over. I've attached my first floor screen shot. The question is, how can I rotate this entire thing (all floors, terrain, slab, etc.) about 45 degrees clockwise? I can rotate the floor easy enough with either a select all and dragging the rotate marker, or by selecting edit area and also dragging the rotate marker but that only rotates the first floor. There is no 'edit all floors' as some posts discuss. Once rotating the first floor, it's pretty much impossible to line up other floors. RIch

I have a plan that I had started out with a survey/plot plan. I added the first floor and rotated it so that it was situated on the plot plan in the right place. I was able to build up the entire house with the house at an angle from the perspective of the screen. But I want to print this plan now. So I want the floors to be horizontal to the screen. I am having the hardest time doing this. I am able to rotate a floor and can even rotate the entire plot plan but I can only do it a floor at a time. And when I try to rotate the second floor, I just can't get things aligned right. The roof's not aligned, the slab's not aligned etc. Doing web searches implies that there is a rotate all floors option but that has got to be a different version of home designer. Is there anyway to do what I want?