Filling an area/face with an object (not image or texture)

SketchUp
1

hi guys, beginner here.
I was wondering if its possible to fill a face of an object with a pattern drawn in sketchup itself. Let me explain what I’m trying to do.

Let’s say I have a face of a table, and I wish to cover the top face of the table with square tiles. Right now I’m drawing a single square from the table top corner, move + copy it multiple times (with the *x command) until I fill the whole face of it.

Is there a simple way of doing it? Like for example, creating the tiles on their own and then select the face of the table and “paste into” the tiles (which will be trimmed/cropped automatically to fit the surface)

edit I do not wish to use images or texture since I want the tiles to be visible in PDF as outlines
Thanks in advance

3

Sort of.

You can certainly create a component tile (say) and then copy it across your table. What you can’t do is automate it to fit exactly. So you would have to do something like this: decide how many tiles wide you want. Place a construction line on the table edge, copy it to the opposite edge and then type /a where a is the number of copies. Do the same for the other direction. You should end up with a grid of construction lines creating rectangles. Now start a component and draw your tile. Then copy it across and along.

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4

For desktop version of SketchUp

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tab-061000×600 375 KB

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5

thanks for the suggestions, much appreciated. I’m glad that i’m doing it “the right way” or in a similar fashion. Unfortunately I can afford sandbox since I’m still starting my journey of sketchup and im just a student/hobbyist.
@simoncbevans will look into tweaking my method through your suggestion (if i understood them correctly)

thanks again

6

This is an elegant solution for those who have access to Sandbox. It should be noted that the grid created is based on a pre-set spacing which may not work with the rectangle selected. Unless the length and width of the underlying rectangle is integrally divisible by the spacing, the grid created will be the nearest that can be fitted within it. But as the grid is automatically made into a Group, you can then use the Scale Tool to stretch it to fit, distorting spacings to suit.

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