@alan fraser said:

Yes, just dreaming. Don't need it anyway, it's as flat as a pancake round here...and the bike has yet to be invented that can tackle the sand dunes on the beach.

you haven't seen a pugsley, fatback, sandman or 9zero7?
~4" tires, low low psi. at home in the sand and the snow.

my pugsley in the snow in the NY mountains, in the snow:

IMAG1477 by mbeganyi, on Flickr

a gent from the UK riding sand / dunes / beaches:

14,5,11 023 by coastkid71, on Flickr

some gents in alaska that bike / packrafted a desolate stretch of coast:

@mitcorb said:

I wouldn't want to sit on that seat for any length of time, though.

here's what i prefer.
longest ride - 258 miles in one go.

enjoy the new bike tobobo.

@dave r said:

@rockersujith said:

... but I find CAD applications more easy and the results are more perfect the 3D view is also more accurate without containing any mistakes and it is trustworthy.

I don't agree with your assertion that SketchUp is inaccurate or creates mistakes. SketchUp is definitely capable of very high accuracy and precision. Mistakes or lack of accuracy are induced by the user.

agreed. sketchup is as accurate as the user makes it.

@dave r said:

I really like your presentation style.

Thanks Dave... try to keep it simple, sometimes with some base colors in there.
Too many copies of these drawings needed to pass around, so no color, and size was limited to what they have access to on site at the open air museum where they are doing the bulk of the work.

-Mike

Another recent project:

A couple more, as I was asked to help detail the engineer's work on hanging this from a museum ceiling in Warsaw...

Thanks for the kind words. I am just a worker bee on this project. The structure is for a recreation project that the Timber Framers Guild is working on in Poland. I was asked to create shop drawings from the engineering work. I took an AutoCad model, cleaned it up, did all the joinery in SkechUp, and detailed in LayOut.

They are currently converting tree to timber with axe and saw, all by hand, and will eventually raise the frame on site, to be later moved to Warsaw. Everything from the interior cupola to the religious paintings are being worked on throughout this summer.

You can check out the project and follow along here:

Re-Creating a Synagogue Roof in Poland

GWOZDZIEC RE!KONSTRUKCJA

Re-Creating a Synagogue Roof in Poland (mcnorlander.wordpress.com)

I'm getting faster with SKP and LO. Its not for everyone, and it takes a certain discipline to break bad habits, or CAD habits. I've been in AutoCAD land with 3rd party overlays since 2002, so it has been a struggle to break away, but for what I do, I've found SKP and LO to be a good mix, and I really like the 'look' of the drawings as much as the process.

There are certainly some learning curve moments, and there are times when I get frustrated with LO... but for the most part, I think it will only get better.

In the last 6 months I've only touched my AutoCAD install to clean up something I needed to import.

Some not so recent examples:

Something I just finished up this week:

Currently working on detailing a custom residence, with timber frame. I'll be doing the architectural work and the timber work in SKP and LO. Presentation work was all done with SKP, jpgs, and sending models back and forth across the Atlantic.

SKP + LO is not for everyone. One of the timber shops that I work with have a 3rd party AutoCAD overlay that integrates modeling with manufacturing - for them, my approach doesn't work - but I still do plenty of SKP presentation models and estimates with them.

But for others, I'm finding its a very workable CAD package for ~$500.

Here's an image of the last model I detailed up.
19 section planes, some of which point in different directions.

Note that the graphics SU uses don't seem to be user scalable, so when you zoom out, the arrow indicators get larger relative to your model, and multiple section cuts overlap, especially when cuts in this model only 2' away from each other point in opposite directions.

Also, when zoomed in you very often can't see the 'edge' of the cut to activate it.

Sounds like this is on the Google Guys and Gals to address...
Thanks for commenting - pretty maddening with 30 section cuts in my last model to zoom out, activate, zoom back, set the view, save or update the scene.

I tried using layers to help manage, but it gets messy...

@thomthom said:

@bmike said:

If I could give the cut a name (S1, Wall A, Floor 1, etc.) and could control visibility in the outliner or on a tool palette, I think my workflow would improve... and I'd spend less time zooming, panning, activating, and then getting things back to the proper view...

You can set up Scenes that only toggles section cuts on/off.

Yup, I'm doing that no problem.
I set up 10-20-30 scenes then open LayOut to detail, setting up views with the corresponding scenes for building sections, etc.

What I'm asking for is:

Way to assign labels / data to section cuts. I'd like to be able to click a cut and see in entity info a 'name', just like any other group / component in SketchUp. This way I could name them after creation - 'Floor1', 'Wall A', Beam Detail 2c', etc. Ideally they would come in with a default, much like components - 'SectionCut1', etc.

And, a tool palette or visibility in the Outliner so I can work with section cuts just like I do any other object. If there were a tool palette, I'd be able to click the name of the cut, it would highlight in my model, then I could 'Make Active', Reverse, delete, Create group from slice, etc. etc. - the cuts would behave in the same logic as most of the other entities within SketchUp.

Not sure if this has been suggested to the SU team, but as I move further into doing construction and presentation documents with SU and LO, I've been wanting easier control of section cut visibility.

I'm using TIGs Section Cut Face, which has sped my workflow considerable - so no issues with the tools themselves - just control over them.

So, for workflow improvement I'd love to have a 'SectionCuts' tool palette or have section cuts show up in the outliner. And I think individual cuts need to have the ability to assign unique names to them. In a model with 15-20 section cuts, some closely spaced, its near impossible to select, right click, and 'Make Active' the specific cut that you want.

If I could give the cut a name (S1, Wall A, Floor 1, etc.) and could control visibility in the outliner or on a tool palette, I think my workflow would improve... and I'd spend less time zooming, panning, activating, and then getting things back to the proper view...

@unknownuser said:

I've heard mixed opinions (and they all seem to be opinions) that you either DO NOT put spray foam between the roof rafters, or it is OK to put spray foam between the rafters.

I was in a house the other day that was loaded with spray foam - it was put everywhere, and I mean LOADED on. The house, still being built, was probably 10 degrees cooler inside than out, and it even had the windows open (no wall coverings up yet). It seemed to be pretty effective.

depends on the detailing, climate, if house has an air exchanger, roof build up, etc. etc.

Nice thing about backedges, even if they don't render in hybrid or vector - is that they do allow you to snap when section cutting through a model...

@dave r said:

Out of curiosity, wouldn't just the Raster-rendered image work for that? Or, you could make a high res image export from SU and insert the image into LO. Of course you'd lose the automatic update if you edit the model but for a few images it might not be so bad.

I guess the raster would be fine. But I have no idea in actual practice. I've only used vector for line heavy work, and hybrid for anything with color and shadows...

I've sent a few pages off to plot with the overlay and with just the raster. We'll see how they plot out.

@dave r said:

Well, you could do it with overlapping scenes. See the attached PDF. I made two scenes, one in simple Hidden Line style and the other with Back Edges turned on. I overlapped the two scenes in LO with them on separate layers. The Hidden Line view is rendered as Vector and the Back Edges scene in Raster.

To be honest, though. I don't see much point in doing this. The quality of the result isn't very good.

Just figured that out by doing a similar test with something I'm working on. Only time it would make sense for me would be for complex joinery / shop drawings...

@jhauswirth said:

LO doesn't support the new hiddenline drawing in hybrid or vector.
It will only show them in raster. In hybrid mode it first renders
everything except edges (it turns off ALL edges) and then it
draws all visible edges as vector on top of the raster image.

Would be great to have it available in hybrid... but in my limited testing it would need some finesse on the software side.

I thought it might work to do 2 viewports, one in raster, another on top in vector, but I can't seem to get that to work - although I did think it possible to have 2 or more windows stacked atop one another with transparent backgrounds...

@dave r said:

I don't see back edges in Hybrid. Here's what I get.

Original SU image with style updated:

LO Raster render:

LO Hybrid render:

Same here. I even exported to PDF, to make sure I wasn't missing something.
And set display of models to 'high'. No dice.

@gaieus said:

Not in vector mode but in hybrid mode it does (where your edges are vectors but your textures are raster). Probably the most resource hungry mode however.

Not seeing this in hybrid, was really hoping for it on a complex project...
Will have to settle for vector, I guess.

Thanks TIG!
I'll look at this weekend. Big project to detail and move into LayOut next week for construction documents, so this will be helpful.

Yes, black is always in my model, usually my line color!