Changing doorstyles on dynamic component cabinets?
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Hi everyone...i'm new here and this is my first post.
i've downloaded/imported a handful of cabinet models from the 3D Warehouse, and the only method for changing cabinet doorstyles that i've seen so far is to use the predefined "hidden" attribute. more specifically, i see that folks are creating multiple door sub-components, each w/ a different style or look, and placing them all in the same physical location w/ respect to the main cabinet component so that they all occupy the same physical space. then the "hidden" attribute is being used to display the doorstyle that is currently selected and to hide the doorstyles that aren't currently selected.
that is fine w/ me so long as the number of doorstyles is minimal...unfortunately the line of cabinetry i'm drawing in Sketchup has a multitude of doorstyles, and i'm not sure that the same method is a feasible solution if for every one doorstyle i make visible at any given time, there are several others that i have to keep hidden. i would imagine that even if 24 out of 25 doorstyles are hidden (and therefore aren't being drawn/rendered by the video card) at any given time, having that many sub-components, (hidden or not) might make the main cabinet component file size unnecessarily large. and while navigating in and around one such cabinet component in Sketchup might work just fine, i'm worried that navigating in a room full of cabinets (a kitchen for instance) might slow to a crawl due to large file sizes. what do you think?
also, i'd like to be able to change the doorstyle on all the cabinets in a room at once, as opposed to having to go around and change the doorstyle on each individual cabinet...i suppose that's another reason why the above solution may not be feasible.
if anyone can tell me why this method is the best way to achieve what i'm looking to achieve, or perhaps suggest an alternative method, i'm all ears.
TIA,
Eric -
by the way, here is an example of a cabinet that uses the above described method of changing doorstyles. i found it in the 3D Warehouse. if you load the component into Sketchup and open the "outliner" window, you can see that the "Door with Handle#2" sub-component is itself composed of other sub-components, two of which are doors (Door#2 and GLD#2). you can also see that when the selected door type is "Laminated chipboard," Door#2 is unhidden and GLD#2 is hidden. likewise, when the selected door type is "Glass," GLD#2 is unhidden and Door#2 is hidden.
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I would have thought use of layers would be the most effective method of displaying or more to the point not displaying particular design alternatives. All items to be on layer 0 except for the ultimate containing component or group which would be on the layer for a particular design alternative. I don't know how sketchup would perform if a large number of design alternatives on many layers would perform. Because there is no layer grouping or hierarchy, sketchup layers do seem to be quite limiting, especially for highly detailed designs.
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Hi
If you explode the door component parent, the invisible options would be destroyed leaving the chosen visible door and its attributes. this would help reduce the file size and rendering.
One could save the original file so that any changes can be made later if required, with a copy of the option chosen.
Hope this helps
Philip -
thank you for the responses. i've pulled off of the doorstyle part of the project...actually, i've put the entire Sketchup project on the back burner for now b/c we've had an influx of business that i have to attend to. in the mean time, i'll research Sketchup layers to see if that's one possible solution to displaying various doorstyles at will. i'll let you know how that works out when i get a chance...
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