Thanks for your response. Actually, scaling it down reduced the file size by nearly one third. Go figure.

I've been working on a car model for a while now, one I downloaded from the warehouse and am modifying. I just noticed that the thing is 54 feet long! Don't know why the guy who created it made it so huge, but I have several questions concerning this.

(1) Is there an advantage to making your model huge over making it to scale?
(2) If I reduce it to scale (about 17 feet long) what affect will that have on it? I know it will reduce the file size, but will that result in better response time when working on it? Will it affect the detail of the model at all? Are there any disadvantages to scaling it down that much?

I just returned from Barnes & Noble after purchasing Sketchup For Dummies and Sketchup the Missing Manual (ouch$$$$), so I hope to be able to figure out a lot of things for myself as I study them, so maybe I won't have to bother you good people quite as much in the future. I must say I love Sketchup, to the point that I've been playing with it instead of winterizing my home, I've downloaded maybe 40 videos from YouTube, and my cats are getting very skinny.

Is there a reason why the "round" objects in so many models in the warehouse are so obviously not round but instead have a bunch of sides? Is there a downside to increasing the segments of a circle to make it smoother? thanks in advance

If I understand this correctly, once you apply a texture to a curved surface there is no way to orient it, you just have to accept whatever arbitrary way Sketchup decides to apply it. Is there no solution to this? If I want a texture applied in a direction other that what SU gives me, there's GOT to be a way to do that, otherwise how would everybody create those great models with textures all applied just the right direction on all of their curved surfaces? Any help would be GREATLY appreciated.

I think I found the glitch. When I install (RDB)Randor, Rotix goes away. Delete Randor, Rotix comes back. Apparently a compatibility problem. Dang, should have tried that before I uninstalled Sketchup.

I've done that, several times. Tried a drastic solution - I uninstalled Sketchup, reinstalled it, installed Rotix, and now it shows up. Now all I have to do is reinstall everything else, that should be fun. Thanks for all your help. By the way, is there a way to set it up so that I'm notified when somebody posts a reply to one of my forum questions? I've been on other forums that do that, it's handy.

No, it is nowhere to be found, absolutely nowhere. There's nowhere else to look for it, it's just not there. The other plugins I installed with Rotix are all there, just not Rotix. It shows up in the Plugins folder, but not in Sketchup

Oh, you mean the actual Plugins folder. Yep, it's sitting there fat and happy. I think it laughed at me.

@dave r said:

Did you look in the plugins folder to see that it got installed there and not somewhere else?

I checked everywhere. I even looked under the computer, thought maybe it fell out. In Window/Preferences/Shortcuts (RBD)Randor shows up, but no (RBD)Rotix. Guess what I'll try next is to uninstall all the plugins I installed at the same time as Rotix, then just install it by itself. Maybe there's some sort of conflict. Then if that doesn't work I'll just soak my 'puter in gasoline and light a match. Kinda chilly today, might feel good.

Yeah, many times. Funny thing is, I "installed" several other plugins at the same time, and they showed up ok. The only thing close to (TBD)Rotix in my Plugins menu is (TBD)Randor, which I installed the same time as Rotix. This is driving me nuts, I installed it because I really need to use it on a model I'm working on.

I've downloaded Rotix, put it in my Plugins folder, but cannot find it anywhere in Sketchup. I've checked everywhere, including the Plugins menu, nothing. I've downloaded and installed it several times. Any suggestions?

@thomthom said:

Then the quickest would be to to apply a new material, but edit the existing.

Could you explain what that means?

@gaieus said:

Just put a simple rectangle in the model and paint it with a material you want to replace the other with.

What I'm looking for is a way to simply choose a material from the Paint Box menu, you know, how would it look in this color, or this color. Your method would be a lot slower, and I'm into instant gratification

Thanks, installed Material Replacer and tried it, but it seems to only be able to replace a color with another color already in the scene, not from the color choices within Paint Bucket

Is there any way, maybe a plugin, to replace all instances of a certain color with another color? Say, if I had a model with 100 surfaces and 37 of them were painted the same color, is there any way to replace the color on those 37 surfaces with another color, without having to paint each one individually? Maybe an eyedropper to sample the color on one of those surfaces, then the ability to choose another color and paint all 37 surfaces at once? Have searched but haven't found anything like this. Thanks

Is there a way, maybe a plugin, that will allow me to accurately rotate an object? What would be really good is a plugin similar to Nudge, that lets you use the arrow keys to move objects in small increments. I have searched extensively for something like this, have come up with zip, so any help will be much appreciated.

Can anybody tell me what those annoying little white sparklies are that appear along the edges of some objects? I would guess they are just a fact of Sketchup, but, hey, it never hurts to ask.

I found the solution to this problem, the Nudge plugin from Smustard. Works fantastic!

Here's an example. I had to select the same 7 edges each time I used the follow me tool.

Ok, I'm using follow me on an object, but I need to use it like 30 times, and I have to select the same 7 edges each time. Is there any way around this, maybe a way to keep the edges selected while I'm using the follow me tool? My poor old fingers are cramping up