Been meaning to do this for some time now. I used a replaceable sliding center panel, an idea I stole, I forget where. I'm trying to decide whether to make or buy hold-down clamps.

drill press table.skp

Try this.

http://www.100kgarages.com/

Good luck.

Here's a design for a router table/extension for a US General contractor's saw. I imagine the Craftsman is similar.

Router table extension

OK, one more idea, then back to work (Damn SketchUp!)

hex hinge.skp

Fred, have you considered solid dowels instead of tubes, in conjunction with some "steroid enhanced" version of the Kreg pocket hole jig for the rafters? If you could size the pocket jig for 1/4" or 3/8" lag screws, and make the dowels out of engineered lumber such as versa-lam, you could develop a pretty predictable load capacity. Versa-lam's strucural values are mostly higher than the wood they're made from, with grain & knot variability eliminated. It's pricey compared to dimensioned lumber, but not compared to steel. It comes in beams and columns, so you could get 4x4s or 6x6s and turn them. They would probably sell you octagonal shapes or even dowels if the order was large enough.

http://www.bc.com/wood/ewp/simpleFraming/versaLam.html

Here's a link to the columns (page 8 of the PDF):

http://www.bc.com/dms/wood/ewp/3_Guide_Resources/east_south_us/3_east_spec_guide/east_spec_25-32.pdf

Tom

How about something like this? 18 gauge would probably work, depending on the loads.

hex hanger.skp

Fred,

A lot of the Simpson line, including the LS series, is available at Lowe's & Home Depot.

Do you plan to support these structures on vertical walls? That would solve one of the biggest drawbacks of the dome concept.

Oops. posted to wrong thread!

Not sure of the loads involved, but this might work, if you could find a simple way to connect them to the pipe. The advantage would be the ability to bend it to any angle.

http://www.strongtie.com/products/connectors/l-ls-ga.asp

Simpson will also make custom connectors, for a price.

Tom

Not sure of the loads involved, but this might work, if you could find a simple way to connect them to the pipe. The advantage would be the ability to bend it to any angle.

http://www.strongtie.com/products/connectors/l-ls-ga.asp

Simpson will also make custom connectors, for a price

Tom

Nice job. Why is there light coming out of the partition track in the ceiling?

I just asked this question on the woodworking forum yesterday, and the consensus was that textures made from high-res files are usually the culprit, not complex geometry. It was true in my case; I had downloaded a wood texture which increased my file size 10 fold.

You can also change the location. Click Window, then Model Information, then Location. select a city with higher or lower latitude, or put in your own. This will change the angle of the shadows more than you can with the sliders alone.

Jim & Dave,

Yes, that was it. I used a downloaded lumber file and adjusted the color using the color wheel. Not sure if it was the original texture or my changing the hue that caused the jump in file size. The file is now under 1 MB.

Thanks for the help.

I have 3 different models, of differing complexities. I would rank them in descending order: bungalow, shellback chair, garden on wheels. But the garden cart was 5300 kb, too big to download (I included a jpg.) The chair was under 1000 kb, and the house was 2900. Is there something I'm doing to cause this variation? I know it's hard to answer without the garden cart model, but the only complex geometry in the model is the wheels. I did purge the components & layers.

bungalow.skp

shellback.skp

Thanks again to all who responded. To anyone else who wants to learn about layers and scenes in woodworking design, I recommend Joe Zeh's Beginner's SketchUp Tutorial Series http://www.srww.com/google-sketchup.htm and especially his "Rules for 3D Drawing Using SketchUp," found in Part 1. There's also a good description of converting JPG files to textures, and orienting and aligning them to components properly, in Part 8.

Jim,

No Pro, but that plugin looks to be what I need.

Thanks!

I'm working on a design for a fold-able chair. Is there a way to demonstrate this capacity in SketchUp? I'm thinking of animating a scene or sequence of scenes. Also, is there a way to link components together such that they pivot on a common axis, but otherwise stay independent, like a cabinet and its door?

Thanks in advance

Tom

No, it works fine. I must have done something along the way, probably while creating the back.

Thanks again, Dave. I'm a little baffled about how it happened. I started with the chair back components, at ground level, but then set it aside and built the seat from the axis, starting with the vertical leg, finally moving the assembled chair back into place. Oh well, it's fixed now; thanks again for all your help.

Tom

A possibly related problem: try as I might, I can't change the main axis so that the "front" camera view shows the front of the chair.