Avocado

I aligned the walls manually - so that worked. However, I do not understand why the walls have a different thickness to them...I certainly never changed it. Is there an explanation to why it does this? The other question I have regarding walls is: You typically start with an exterior wall to create the outline of the house. What do you do when you end up with gables between the exterior walls. In the kitchen east wall, it starts with an exterior wall but then changes to an interior wall so the wall thickness is not the same, but in reality it will be framed with 2 x 6's the entire gable length. (attached file) Last -I added a water closet in the MBa - wanted 6' min depth so made a doorway and added an interior wall. (cut into the closet a bit but that's ok) Kind of worked - but could not get the doorway to open up to the 48" width of the water closet space.(attached file) water closet.pdf kitchen wall.pdf

Thanks, I will try that. Also, I was looking at the family room earlier and see that 2 of the walls ( behind the fireplace and the wall to the hallway) have a step in them (in the rendering view) The step on the fireplace wall has a step at 9' (that apparently matches the room height behind the room (closet and wine cellar). And the wall between the room and the hall has a step at 10' (which matches the hall height. Why does this occur and how can I adjust for this ?

Eric, Thanks... I definitely appreciate your comments! Yes, I like the interior lintel idea. I'll be working on the interior this week (my wife is going to give me "suggestions" for the kitchen next. That shutter idea is really good - don't know if you noticed but since I had such a tall ceiling, I added an attic space behind the fireplace wall (10x20) with access from attic stairs in the closet. ( still need to add that if available in the library) I am going to have wood ceilings and beams in this room as well as MBr. I'll uses the soffit tool to create the beams and call out wood for the ceiling material. I made half walls to create the courtyard and selected "No Room Definition" which got rid of and floor in this space. When I tried to add a couple arched niches in the wall using the door tool, it made a complete vertical cut into the height of the wall. The cut was the width of the door I called out. (16"). Not sure what my options are there...

I originally created the courtyard by enclosing this area so then I used the room spec. to define the height of my walls. Now when I set a wall to "No Room Definition", my wall height changed. And the slab is still there - double clicking this area you can see the "defined" space highlighted is larger than the courtyard now.

Now that sounds like the best way. Thanks!

Since I will have different materials, isn't that the best way ?

Actually, to clarify a bit - I was going to do this just like the back patios - create a slab - edit it to size and then apply pavers as a material. In the courtyard - I am going with pavers under the loggia, a "sidewalk of pavers to the entrance and than dirt /plants. Also around the fireplace as well

Planning on pavers.

Tuesday update - I am getting closer to understanding the program a bit more. Was able to do update the garages and work the roofs manually - still slow but getting better at it. On the lintels, I updated all these - you can select the lintel option and extension past the window width but the extension does not appear unless you deselect recessed window into wall under windows / options.H ad some trouble creating a hole in the roof using the skylight option - There is a gap right along the ridgeline of the roof and my walls got messed up a bit. I'll go back to it later. Right now I just picked a fireplace out of the library and used the soffit tool to create a chase. The one thing I cannot figure out is the courtyard flooring - it creates a slab floor as part of the overall slab of the house. Under room spec // structure - I deselected what I thought might work - "floor under this room", "floor supplied by foundation below" and " monolithic slab foundation" but to no avail. What am I missing ? DeLuz_3_14.Garages_2B.plan

Framing for a fireplace - I know this has to be pretty simple - I am framing for a fireplace but cannot get the framing to extend through the roof.

Tuesday update: I thought I was finished with the roof yesterday....unitl I noticed 2 major issues - somehow during the learning process, I changed the ceiling height to 9' which for the entry hall with 8' doors ( plus beams in the ceiling) doesn't work. Also, at one point using a railing outside the MBR, the cathedral ceiling was no longer centered. Amazingly, I think I have it figured out. Please take a a look and let me know if it looks right. My next step will be the garage and walls/entry to courtyard. For the garage entry between the doors, the walls are going to be 12" thick - should I create 2 walls, 1 exterior , 1 interior ? Also on the courtyard, if my wall is say 16" thick, 2 exterior walls? On this, I would it deep enough so I can put 2 piece clay tile with a ridge cap along the top. DeLuz_3.6.2_10'_ceiling.plan

OK - I think I made the correct changes. Eliminated the railing (to create the porch) and used the room divider tools to create the outdoor "space". Used the Framing tools to create a post w/footing as well as a beam. I did the porch roof but with the 2 x 6 rafters sitting on top of the beam, the lower part of the beam was under 8'. ( I was using a 8 x 14 beam with 8x8 posts for some visual substance to the structure.) I fixed an out of alignment wall so that error has gone away. I rebuilt the foundation and I think it looks right now. I notice that checking this box in defaults is only good 1 time since it reverts right back to be unselected with no warning. Am I on the right path (?), if so I will do this for the posts and beams in the courtyard as well. Again, thanks for the help! DeLuz_3.5.1.plan

Thanks for the insight...will give it a shot.

Porch area and slab / no slab / footing : Since the last update, correcting the walls where the framing was exposed, I was able to add a 2nd floor above the wine cellar and closet - no problems - worked the 1st time! I also added a porch along the south facing kitchen which helps the look on this side. Have been using the sun/shadows tools to see how it affects the sun coming into the house throughout the year. My 1st issue....I have 3 porches on the S and SW sides. I plan on doing pavers in all these areas as well as connect these porches together with a walkway. On the kitchen side - I can show just a footing but when I try the same settings for the other porches - it does not show up this way. I spent an hour trying to get this right but can't seem to hit the right combination.. I also have seen what looks like a baseboard along the edge as well as framing along the bottom??? 2nd - I think I have the roof correct now - but I tried to modify the roof and then build roof again checking off (retaining edited roofs) and I ended up with a new roof over top the old roof. Is there another way around this ? DeLuz_3.3.plan

Thanks Eric! I agree the garages could use a bit more work. On the kitchen/nook area - I like it! Because of the views from the house, I needed the angle but knew it just didn't work well. I'll work on that next... On the Ceiling height, I thought it looked better to widen the tall portion of the house so I increased the height of both the closet and wine cellar.Also I liked how the roof continued from the front loggia to the back porch area. I want to add small windows in this space. Since it will be empty space - I thought of having a pull down staircase in the closet to access this and use it for possible attic storage. Did you notice how the exterior walls above the wine cellar showed exposed studs instead of just stucco ?

Wednesday - 3/1 - I've attached the latest file... Eric - I did like your suggestion on the garage layout - changed it up a bit so it will work for the topography. Lost one garage space but the 2 car garage is only for storage. The plan shows where the driveway will come from. I was concerned about the affect of the heel height vs. height of patio cover, so I have the roof raised 6.5" + 5.5" rafter ht = 12". This should be correct now although I will still have to close up the gaps you can see on the rendering. So now as I understand this, the best way to do a roof is 1 - Select gables (if wanted), 2 - Build roof automatically, 3 - If not satisfied with a particular roof - edit manually. Make sure the manual edit roofs is checked in the build roof window so it doesn't keep changing on you. Is that the best way ? Are there any issues with the roof that you see ? Opinions ? The exterior walls at closet and wine cellar are not rendering properly. I don't understand what is going on. When I have a wall (like the north wall at closet/wine cellar, should this be drawn as an exterior wall. I show it as an interior right now. I think I'm getting there.... DeLuz_3.1.plan

Monday update - After 4 versions of the layout, I believe I have narrowed it down to one. Will have to get to the property in the next couple weeks and make sure I have the room for the pad. In the meantime, I have been trying to figure out how to get a more accurate visual (height wise) of the exposed rafter tails, no frieze board - It will continue with stucco between the rafter tails. So after too much time, I think I may have the solution and would like to know if this all works out. I have attached a sample file as well to show what I did. 1. Build roof - specs - √ trusses ( no birds mouth). Under structure, change rafter width from 1 1/2" default to 4". Then to Build Framing: trusses:Member Depth - changed top chord depth to 6". With the fascia all turned off as well as gutters off, I was able to get exposed rafter tails in the correct dimension. Next step was to add the heel height (12") for the trusses - I went back to Build Roof - Roof Height: Raise/Lower from ceiling height - entered in 6". 6" of raising roof + 6" of top chord of truss = 12" total. Finally, in the rendering view, I selected each raised roof portion and dragged it flush with the top of the top chord (rafter) so it would show stucco between the rafter tails. Success ? Oh No, all my trusses are white and I don't see it in the materials selection. So the 2 questions I have are: 1. Is this a good way of showing the correct visual height and rafter tail size ? and 2. Can I easily change the truss exposed rafter tail to a wood color ? Exposed rafters tails:heel height.plan

Excellent- Thanks for all your help! I now have some homework to do...I'll be back

Thanks for the explanation on the working the roof planes together. Wow - I will have to read it a few times to get my head wrapped around it. This will be great practice!

For the Roof defaults, since I am planning on using trusses (2x4's), then bolting the exposed rafter tail (4 x 6,notched to height of 2x4 and also notched to accept the tongue and groove soffit, in the defaults settings, I should set the rafter to 1 1/2 x 3 1/2, correct? Since I want to show the renderings with the exposed rafter tails and to do this in HD PRO 2017, the only way around this (that I know) is to resize the rafters, should I set the rafters to 3 1/2 x 5 1/2 ?

I'll give it a try now. Thanks...

Ok, so mine does not look like yours. I've attached the image and the plan as well. There is one problem I noticed yesterday - The garage on the top right and the 1st room coming is had a ceiling height set at 125 +/- so i removed the roofs and set them to 120" which is what I originally planned. I manually redid the roofs except I am a bit stuck as to where to go next. Trying to get to where you were (I've attached one of your renderings but added roof plane numbers, I didn't have a problem creating roof planes 1 and 2 together, then 3 to 2. Next I created 4 to 5 roof planes but I don't understand the process/steps taken to connect roof plane 5 to 2 and 3 and also 4 to 3. The attached plan shows where I am stuck on... I've also changed the height of the roof (increasing) so it would tie in to the roof over the Bedrooms 2 and 3. AutoRebuildRoof 2.24.pdf DeLuz_2_23.ceilingto10ftcorrected.plan Roof planes.pdf

I'll try that right now.

I do like the ideas. Thanks, but I don't have that much space front to back on the property due to the slope of the property...more room left to right (looking a the entry) Still working on the steps to get the kitchen roof done correctly.

Yes - that is exactly what I was shooting for. Thank you. I will work on this.