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Wall Tool Construction Method Techniques

Making walls in ARCHICAD is one of the most basic functions, and one of the first things we all learn how to do. And yet…there are some hidden techniques that are worth discussion.

Recently a fellow ARCHICAD expert was venting about all the different thickness walls in an old house he was modeling. He was frustrated that he had to create unique composites for each thickness. It’s an experience we’ve all had with measuring existing projects. Most walls are one dimension but others are slightly fatter and for some random reason there’s one or two oddballs that might be super skinny or unreasonably fat. Often these dimensions expose the history of the house: a 2×4’s dimensions have changed over time, so if you know when a house was built you can assume that the studs are 3 1/2″ or 3 7/8″ or even 4″ thick. Likewise, an old enough house might have 5/8″ or 3/4″ of plaster rather than 1/2″ gyp bd on the walls. But of course old houses always defy logic. While we might use those standard material thicknesses to determine the typical construction of a wall, there are always secrets. Maybe a previous owner added drywall on top of old plaster. Or perhaps there’s just wacky framing. Whatever the reasons, after some rationalizing of the dimensions, there are always unique conditions.

And of course this happens on new construction too. We occasionally need a wall that’s 1/2″ or 1″ thicker than the other walls. We sometimes need to furr out or frame around to get the alignments we want. There are always reasons. And solutions. One solution is to create custom Composites for each condition. Another is to create a Complex Profile with vertical and horizontal stretch turned on. Both solutions have their plusses and minuses-which we can maybe discuss in the comments. My favorite solution for these conditions is using the Trapezoid Wall Tool Construction Method. The following video covers the why and how (along with some other Wall Tool Construction Method techniques and caveats). Enjoy:

This was my first video recorded on my new laptop. The sounds quality is SO SO SO much nicer. Follow Shoegnome on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Youtube.

Comments

  • February 14, 2017
    reply

    Hi Jared…

    Thanks for the video! As for us, we have created custom composites for the 8-10 conditions we typically have in our projects, and just migrate them to new projects. Didn’t seem like a big deal at the time, but we will looking forward to other AC users’ opinions and comments on this topic. Steve Nickel

  • February 15, 2017
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    Mohammed

    Hi Jared

    Thank you very much for sharing this with us.
    I wish I had known this technique sooner because I am currently working on a project where there are like 10+ wall thicknesses with different insulation options. Imagine having to create plastered wall composites of different thicknesses with the same material without using this little hack.

  • February 17, 2017
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    This is great Jared. Im just trying to learn archicad and im doing an old little project to práctice and i have this very situation, this will help a lot!

    By the way, and i know this is not the place for this, but Im doing the transition to bim. Even though i consider my self very good in CAD 3d and 3dmax, the process has been painful to say the least.

    Some years ago i tried taking some revit courses and absolutely hated It. So i put the bim to rest, but now that i run my own small práctice, i want to jump in again…. I was sold on archicad last year when i saw a demonstration, but after taking the course and getting a rental license, i disvovered some major omissions. Dont get me wrong, im trying my best to love the software, but there are issues that i still cant get my head into:

    First, that you cant import a terrain and automatically generate it, like in any other 3d program (Even sketchup handles this quite easily).

    Another one is object creation. I would love to learn GDL, but like so many users, i dont think i ever will. (Can i model all my ad hoc objects with just morph??)

    Another one is the inability to have múltiple windows with different views where anything you do in one window, say plan view, automatically updates in the other views. While this is something that one may get used to, It makes It very cumbersome. There are more issues, but these ones are the ones i remember now.

    I will finish this project and then do It again in revit and then decide in which software i felt more confortable. I will have to be many times more confortable in archicad to implement It since revit is becoming the standard in my country (mexico) rven though only big companies and projects required it for now.

    But as an archicad user, and now that archicad 20 is here, i would love to hear your opinion about the state of archicad among the industry. Can we still be competitive if we stick with archicad over revit?

    Regards. Jt

  • March 17, 2017
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    José

    Wow! thanks Jared… Friday night, 11pm, reading various tutorials and modeling the aforementioned project in Archicad. Now that im learning the complex profiles and composites its getting better actually! still miss the ability to select one thing in one view and have it selected in another, but still, i have a long way to go!

  • May 18, 2017
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    josé

    Something strange happenned. I stuck to the self impossed schedule of making one little old and very simple project in Archicad. After I (un)finished it, not very satisfied i must say, i jumped on the Revit ship. I Did almost all of the basic course on a site called Lynda (absolutely amazing site by the way) but kept reading info about archicad. As i proceded with each chapter on how to do things in Revit, each more arcane and obscure than the last one, i suddenly began to be like “man, i already know how to do this in archicad. More easily!”.

    I must say the grouping thing in Revit is amazing, i like how the Ribbon always remains the same and have a consistency to it (not you AutoCad ribbon, you suck), the site modeller is great and also how you can link files and the way revit handles coordinates (as in, no coordinates), and love the way you place objects with the temporary dimensions (they worked great in the excercise files, i would hope they work the same in more complex projects), also one always seems to be in control with objects and the way of selecting and working with them (because Archicad´s pet pallet sometimes seem to have a life on its own); the mass modeler seems to have infinite potential specially if paired with Dynamo (Revits equivalent to grass hopper, but i didnt get that far), the undo/redo function works much better that in archicad, and the families are cool although i realized that at least for now i dont really need all my objects to be parametric , nor do i need my objects like beds and faucets modeled exactly as they are, because that´s what specifications are for, and even if i needed them to be real for my renders i wont be doing it neither in revit or archicad.

    But you were right about not being able to work in multiple windows in real time in archicad; in Revit you can, but it turns out that you cant do a lot of things in all the views, so other than selecting objects more easily, i didnt find much benefit to it; even the tutorials teacher basically never used it, and the marquee tool trumps it 10x anyway.

    And most importantly, the same thing that put me off the first time i used Revit is still there… that weird clunkiness, the feeling that you need to put a lot of time and resources just to get past over the perceived inflexibility, and the ohh so many warnings!! they appear even for some simple walls and it deletes objects automatically if you are not careful! I don´t know about you, but unless i ask, i don´t want any software to tell me if the simple buildings im doing can be built or not, because that´s what architects and engineers are for, right? It surely is a great software, but i cant help but feeling that if you don´t have everything defined in your project by the time you begin modelling it in Revit you will have a hard time. I havent found one single positive comment about having too many constraints and parameters in big projects. Maybe some Revit expert can dispel this for us.

    So that´s when Archicad finally made click!, as i studied Revit basic concepts its when Archicad workflow finally made sense to me. I said “lets do it” and began modelling a small real project and in three weeks, just using basic tools, some complex profiles and some boolan operations, i already have more information from the model than the last 2 months. I have enjoyed it a lot to see how all the information begins to add up! I still have to finish to understand those pen sets and layouts, but i guess ill finish modelling and then worry about that. If this video is true, and if at least half of this can actually be achieved, ill be very happy!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6V6sZSLU1s

    So to finish this rant, my take is that Revit is kind of a construction simulator: there seems to be a tool for everything (which is good) and the process for making some things kind of resemble the way you would do them on site (which is also good to a certaing degree), maybe that is the reason for so many warnings. But also, like working on site, if you make a change you basically have to demolish everything and do it again, and on site you need a working crew, and for what i have seen you would need it working with revit even for a midly sized project (a BIM manager? yeah sure let´s add it to the bill for the client to pay it, they will happily comply).

    Archicad on the other hand, seems much more flexible. In capable hands it seems to be able to do wonders, but it would also let you get away with your model even if you really dont know what you are doing constructability wise. In that sense i find it no different from modelling in autocad of sketchup (like, you can even make tables or even walls with the slab tool!). I really dont know if this is TRUE and PURE BIM, or if it even matters, but also, because of that flexibility it seems very possible that you can be much faster than in revit, specially if you are a small office or working solo.

    So, if i had the resources to hire revit modellers and i didnt have to model anything myself, then, why not, i would be using Revit for sure. If im the one that is going to be doing the modelling, which happens to be the case, then i will stick with Archicad… There, i finally said it! and the 21 version is looking good so far

  • June 4, 2017
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    josé

    On the contrary Jared, thanks for you encouraging words. Someone told me the other day that i was kinda lucky that i started this late in the BIM game (relative to others), in the sense that both Revit and Archicad have made huge improvements in the last four years or so in terms of modelling, usability and interconnectivity (and the fact that i didnt have to wait forever for a certain tool. I wont mention it by name, but it makes stairs). But what im really exited about in archicad 21 is the ability to edit curtain walls in all views, not just 3d. Lets see what else they have in store.

    i complained about the lack of something similar to autocad blocks, but then i found your article about saving morphs and other stuff as objects. If you overwrite the objetcs it all updates like a block! so i can live with it… for now.

  • September 22, 2017
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    josé

    After some changes i finally issued some construction documents… im quite organized with Autocad layers, so archicad layers came naturally to me… my original idea as was to model in archicad and export some views to Autocad to make the curtain walls plans and steel work plans and also the site work plans…. and then BAM! so this is what layer combinations are for! i could get all the above mentioned plans just with some layer combinations and some layout work… BAM! View Maps, Layouts, publishing sets, it all numbers automatically, and if i move stuff around it organizes itself…. i finally got the graphic overrides! you can make a plan where all the steel beams appear in red while everything else appears in gray. I was able to get some pretty isometrics with 3d views, sections, 3d views… the door drawings were already done and i didnt even realize it until i checked the schedule… i didnt have one single crash in all this time! I used your trapezoid wall tip a LOT.

    Man, It truly is an absolutely spectacular piece of software…

  • April 20, 2021
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    Jose

    Hi Jared, just passing by to say hi. Its been more than 4 years since i was up at night learning Archicad, and im still learning, but so far ive had a blast with it. A complete life changer. I want to thank you again for your encouraging words back then.

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