thanks for the quick response gaieus, i'm gonna try that on my model, i'll be posting the results of that, thanks again

Unfortunately Sketchup does not handle large models very well so switching between apps will require SU to 'reload' the scene which will take a while especially with shadows on. I cannot respond much about importing your CAD plans (assume ,dwg) as I do not know if you imprted it in the beginning or after you already had a large model, which would explain it if indeed it was the latter.