Struggling with my Bay window (3 problems)


PhilipHerlihy
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Working on my first ever plan in HD Interiors.  (Well impressed).  I have three problems - I hope it's ok to aggregate them here.

 

  1. Firstly, every time I save, or undo, I get a message "A Zero width cabinet has had its width changed to bne inch...".  Presumably I've left a spurious object in my plan, but how do I find it?
  2. I've created a bay, after studying carefully the exact construction of my house.  I've added a pair of curved exterior walls (which jumped around all over the place as I was trying to draw them!), plus a straight exterior wall section between them, where I want to put a pair of glass doors.  However, the left one (seen from the inside) is always obscured with what looks like a sheet of plywood.  I've tried everything I can think of to get rid of this, entirely without success.  What am I doing wrong?
  3. Finally, the configuration of what I'm calling a bay window is as shown in the uploaded photo - the main wall of the bay provides something like a window seat.  I've tried (again) everything I can think of to get this into my model, but I've failed.

If there's anyone out there with a few minutes to put a newcomer straight, I'd certainly be grateful!

 

Phil Herlihy, London

Phil.zip

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Not sure what happened but I cannot download your attachment and I could find no attached image.

 

When working with curved walls it helps to temporarily turn off "Angle Snaps", in any case it takes practice to learn how to extrude and control curved walls  (you probably already know this by now)/

 

DJP

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Thanks, David.  I've just deleted and re-uploaded a zip file of bits and pieces, so that may have caused the problem you found - sorry!  If you do have a few minutes then it might be worth refreshing your browser with F5.
Yes, it certainly does take some practice - there's a lot to learn.  I did do better when I turned off the snaps (all of them).

I've found by experimentation that the 'plywood' only appears when I try to install any kind of door at that exact spot.  I'm stumped!

Likely to slope off to bed shortly - it's gone midnight here.

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Hi Phil

 

the only cabinet you have is a bright red soffit speared thru the wall on the RH side of the Door in the "Bay area" with curved walls...

at least that I can find ....I was going to turn off everything but cabinets in the display options but saw you had a soffit only , wasn't too hard to find being RED :)

 

 

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Have you somehow made plywood your default door material ...so it only shows when you add a door perhaps?

 

does the real "Bay" have a door ? or is it a bay window with a seat ?  as per photo?  is the a door in the middle?

 

 

will keep looking at it....

 

M

 

 

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hi Phil , you have more than 1 issue with your walls   :)   I'll post some pics , excuse the handwriting , my mouse writing skills aint too good apparently...

 

Looks like you have your exterior doors set up as "Recessed" and no exterior Casing , this also turns off the Jamb which is why you are seeing wood/framing in the

door-ways , turn casing on and set it to 0mm,1mm 0mm and make the material stucco , so you cant see the framing in the doors.  I couldn't get it to make a plywood door per your pic but I didn't try an arch top top like you.

 

David will no doubt have some advice too

 

Mick.

 

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I can't tell you how grateful I am for this!  Yes, I'm a complete beginner, and learning from my mistakes.

 

That 'soffit' was my equivalent of a yardstick on the ground - it was created to give me a visual indication of how far out the curved walls should come.  The unexplained error message pre-dates that.  I'll remove it once I'm sure I no longer need it.

 

We have to order some furniture shortly - today as it happens - and I'll need to spend the rest of the afternoon planning what we should try to fit in before heading off to the store, so I'll have to correct my walls later in the week.  I'd been nudging two rooms (Forest and Garden rooms) to the exact correct size, to make this an accurate planning task, and I hadn't thought to consider the impact on the upper floor!  I'm very grateful for your taking the trouble to point out these errors.  I'll certainly try the fix you suggest for the 'plywood' and I'll report back.

Meanwhile, I'm attaching a couple of photos of the (real) house, which is here:  http://leytonstone.net/bushwood

 

The walls of the bay are the same thickness as the main walls (39cm) and most of the bulk of those walls lies inside, with wooden surfaces making a convenient seat.  From the main room, you access the bay by passing through an arch formed mainly by a supporting member which holds up the (non-bay) walls of the upper floor.  I find I don't have a decent photo of this - the detail already uploaded is the only one I have.  (Note to self...)

 

I must say I'm a bit dismayed to realise the bay walls in my plan aren't aligned, and that two seem to overlap!  I suspect I'll struggle to figure out how to correct this.

 

Anyway - I have to concentrate on furniture (and another deadline) for the next 48 hours or so, but thank you so much for your interest and your help.  I owe you a pint!

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I must say I'm a bit dismayed to realise the bay walls in my plan aren't aligned, and that two seem to overlap!  I suspect I'll struggle to figure out how to correct this.

That commonly happens when you draw anything using any tool with "Angle Snaps" off (it is very difficult to draw anything straight with angle snaps off, so learning when to make sure they are on or off is part of the learning curve).

 

The basic most fundamental "understanding" one must have while using this software is that "settings" in Default Settings and other dialogs (radio button positions, input box values and other end user choices) control whatever results you are getting and so only the appropriate settings will affect a successful outcome. The software is purely mechanical and requires just the right control of the end user to gain a successful outcome. Learning all of that takes time and experience viewing a lot of wrong guesses along the way so with time you become more and more efficient and competent.

 

DJP

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I hope this isn't duplicated - the reply I've just written has vanished.
 

Thanks, David: well put.  This is impressive software that deserves respect.

I've tried fiddling quickly with the settings Mick suggested, but I can't get the plywood to disappear.  I don't have an option in defaults to control whether exterior doors are 'Recessed' - I'm using HD Interiors, which has less options.  (See screenshot).

 

Meanwhile, I'm getting marvellous results with the furniture - specifying tables and cabinets to match what we're thinking of buying, and dropping them into place before whirling round in 3D.  It's helping so much with the decisions we need to make this week.  I'll tackle the walls later this week - I'm rather thinking the errors Mick pointed out are what's causing the plywood manifestation.

 

Thank you so much for your help - it's greatly valued.

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try setting the casing to 0mm then Phil and see if it covers the Framing/studs I see in the exterior Doorways.....it might be white? but you can change the exterior casing material to the same stucco as the house to make it look like the stucco wraps into the recess and back to the door.

 

those are thick walls ...wow ...

 

you can probably use the bay window tool to make the bay/bow window tool instead to make the Bay as I think they allow for doing the window seat....

 

Your roof can be more correctly modelled using the Upper Pitch checkbox if you have it in Interiors? in the Wall DBX.  The two Pitch Roof or Gullwing as HD calls it is pretty easy and there is a good tutorial in the KB on doing it.

 

good luck on the furniture shopping.....

 

M.

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One Tip for drawing curved walls is to draw a CAD Circle the right radius/diameter 1st , then the curved wall  will try to "Snap to it" as you draw the wall , you can also use CAD lines to 1/4 the circle ( turn on arc centres) so you can tell where the wall intersection points are....when all is good you can delete the cad circle and lines...

 

Keep angle snaps on as David suggested but check out the other options too in Prefs.  you can change there colour too so they are easier to see as you can for the selected item , it doesn't have to be grey .... edit handles can be resized too and made red or what ever colour you prefer .

 

M.

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