You're very kind HornOxx. I'm certainly no plumber or electrician but Sketchup has been invaluable in helping me to get things done and, indeed, understand why I was doing it! A slimmed down version of the Layout file I used is attached.

SU Layout 2015 version.layout

Thank you for your kind words Bryan. I really wanted to illustrate the premise of the infinite Library. Borges's description is loose enough to allow a broad interpretation. However, the very real limitation is that I wasn't able to create a model that could do it (the Library) justice. I'm quite happy with the render that I did complete but the requirement for more and more gallery modules to be in view to give the infinity impression just slowed the model and render process exponentially. This is despite using Chedda's excellent mirror suggestion. What you see in the final render is really the limit of what can be shown in any one view. Anything more always seems to reveal a space at the end of the reflected views that needed another gallery to fill it! And so on....

So, not a dead end but more of a limit reached perhaps. It was a very enjoyable learning experience and not at all wasted. Not sure what I will try next but likely there will always be the false starts and trail of unfinished models!

Hmm.. I see a plus one there so maybe there will be others who can see a resemblance to their own! For the record, no mothers-in-law or ex mothers-in-law were used as source material for this model.

A variation to add to this post. This window does not use a dummy frame to aid placement. Instead, The window component is exploded straight after insertion. Each cutting sub-component and the window itself has a red 'Gizmo' as part of the component. These are placed away from the wall so they can be selected more easily. All the gizmos are occupying the same position. Now, by selecting the gizmos, the window plus it's wall cutters can all be moved together. The gizmos are on a layer (Tag) of their own and this can be turned off when not required.

I have added a simple setting out range for bricks, in this case 225mm for a brick and one mortar joint. Using this, windows & doors etc. can be set out to make the bricklayers' life easier!

New window component placed on left. Window on right exploded.

Window & cutters selected by gizmos. Can be moved using setting out range.

Gizmo layer (tag) turned off. Inner & outer wall leaves cut.

Multi-cut window v2015 rev 03.skp

@shawb said:

A powerful reminder that such terrible events have no relevance to our lives today.

That should have read that such events are, of course, still relevant to our lives today. Excuse my poor proof reading!

After yet another go at this I found the following. The Component Options and Component Attributes panels can be opened at any point in a modelling session including after selecting/deselecting existing components (not necessarily dynamic components) or creating new components. However, the Options panel must be opened first. Any component selected will now show up in the Options panel. Before the Attributes panel can be launched a component (any) must be selected. Once the Attribute panel is launched the selected component can be deselected without any inputs to either panel. Thereafter, components can be selected, attributes added etc. Both panels will work as expected. Both panels can be dismissed if not needed further but to relaunch them the same sequence must be observed.

Maybe this behaviour is a quirk of just my own setup but the procedure that I found (stumbled across) is certainly not in any way an explanation.

Well done! Cosy indeed.

Just realised that the insertion point (Component axis) of the pump should have been set at the mid point between the two valves. Revised SKP attached.

Component orientation revised.skp

Thank you Bryan, now wondering where to go next! I have a notion for one particular model but it will depend on the available source material. I was looking at your excellent Blog page this very morning, you're range of transport covers a, somewhat, greater span of years than mine; 2000 year old Chinese tricycles to spaceships. I consider myself to be definitely stuck in the steam age!

Thank you Daniel and a belated Happy New Year to all!

An update.

The cause of this problem appears to be a folder or filename starting with a lowercase 'u'. I am grateful to the person who described this on this or another forum (couldn't find the post again) and Yogesh at SU support.

I didn't think this was what was causing the problem on my setup as I knew that I never name files or folders with lowercase letters. However, the culprit was further up the file path in the C:\ directory thus: C:\ Users\ user. It was this last folder name with its lowercase 'u' that was at the heart of the problem. How the folder came to be there (in the SU file path) I do not know. I think I probably messed up right at the start when naming my desktop account on the new PC (three years ago now).

My solution has been to do a reset of the whole PC, which it needed anyway, and then being careful about names and file paths. SU support say they accept this problem as a known bug so there may be a fix at some point without going to the lengths of resetting or meddling with the PC inner workings.

Hope this may explain what is happening for anyone else who has the problem but apologies for not being able to offer a quick fix.

Hello All

I re-visited this thread recently and would like to share what I have been doing in relation to hatches in Layout. This is very much experimentation but it may be of use to someone.

Start in Photoshop with a new file. After a few tries with different size layers in Photoshop I went with a 1400px by 1400px transparent base layer and drew lines to form the hatching using the Path tools. These I believe are vector elements. I had an idea that if, instead of drawing the hatch lines themselves, I could fill the negative spaces with wide lines and leave the hatch lines as transparent spaces. The image is saved as a PNG. I formed just two (hatch) lines in the image as this was near the maximum that the Path line tool can cover (1000px max width of Path line). I'm no expert in Photoshop (or SU/Layout for that matter) so my explanation is probably lacking in detail. However, it does seem to me that the Path tools give a better/crisper line result even when zoomed.

In Layout, the PNG can be loaded into the Pattern inspector tab. A solid fill is enabled in the Shape inspector and this is masked by the PNG. The colour of the shape fill is, therefore, visible through the transparency of the PNG. Thus the hatch can be any colour. The limitation with this method is the hatch lineweight is fixed by the PNG image although when zoomed the line does thicken.

Attached is a version 2015 Layout file with three hatch pattern PNGs plus a PDF of the same. These are used at different scale factors and fill colours.

Have a look and see what you think!

PS Did anyone catch the Sketchup April Fool on Youtube? Worth a look!

Hatch tests 02.layout

Hatch tests 02.pdf