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    How to best link one model to another?

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    • P Offline
      PetterSketch Newcomers
      last edited by

      I am drawing architechtural houses i separate models and then placing them on a separate terrain model for each project. What is the best way to do this? I want to do all architectural changes in the architect model and I then would like the terrain/project model to be updated. I tried to save the achitectural model as a component, then importing it, placing in in the project model in the correct position and then, after som additional changes in the architect model, tried to update/reload the model in the project model. It worked but the house did not turn up in the project model in the correct position.

      Is it possible to do what I want? How do you do it?

      I am using the 2022 Pro version.

      Thanks for all input.

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      • BoxB Offline
        Box
        last edited by

        A simple way to look at it is to create a footprint (say the concrete slab) for the architectural model where you want it and make that a component, use Save as from the context menu when you right click on the component, either in the model or in the component window. This allows you to save the component to a place of your choice.
        Then if you open that model, it will open without the wrapper, you will be inside the component ready to edit. Build your house but don't move the geometry away from the axes as that is the locator for placement within the other model. Save your changes.
        Go back to the original model, once again right click on the component and select reload, navigate to the edited model. This will replace the 'footprint' with the now edited geometry.

        So the trick is the position. The axes in the original component is where the reloaded geometry will be placed. As soon as you import or anything like that the position is changed. You can choose to move the component within your original model and it will continue to reload wherever you put it, but keep in mind that if you move the geometry way from the axis when editing the component model, it will move it in the same way in your original.

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        • P Offline
          PetterSketch Newcomers
          last edited by

          Thank you. Interresting idea. I am using the architect model in many different terrain models and sometimes I am having many copies in one terrain model, so I assumee that does not work. I also want to create the höuse in line withthe axis (makes it easier to draw), but the positions in the terrain model (-s) is seldom in line with the axis.

          But your idea of a footprint gave an easy, but not perfect, idea. Just making a footprint of each house in the terrain model, separate from the house component, make it easy to reposition the house after reloading it.

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          • BoxB Offline
            Box
            last edited by

            It appears I am not understanding what you want to achieve, so I'll leave it to others.

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            • Rich O BrienR Offline
              Rich O Brien Moderator
              last edited by Rich O Brien

              If you have 2 SketchUp instances open on your device.

              Instance#1 has terrain.skp and Instance#2 has component.skp

              terrain.skp lives at pathtofile/terrain.skp and component.skp lives at pathtofile/components/component.skp

              pathtofile/components/ is where you save your components so they appear in your Component Library

              In terrain.skp you place component.skp into your modelspace in Instance#1

              Now in Instance#2 that has the model at the path pathtofile/components/component.skp open you make changes and save them

              Go to Instance#1 and right-click the appended component.skp object and pick reload. And changes are pushed to terrain.skp

              As my 6 sided ozzie pal pointed out. Any changes, including moving ,to the pathtofile/components/component.skp are applied in terrain.skp on Reload.

              Download the free D'oh Book for SketchUp 📖

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              • G Offline
                Glenn at home
                last edited by

                Something like an "Xref" in CAD?

                SketchUp Pro 2024/2025 Dell XPS 8950 i9-12900K 64GB Ram RTX 3080

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                • J Offline
                  JGA
                  last edited by

                  @glenn at home said:

                  Something like an "Xref" in CAD?

                  It's not automatically updated like an Xref.
                  Perhaps more like redefining a block from a separate DWG file in AutoCAD.

                  Regards,
                  JGA

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