After using SketchUp Pro for some time now and watching many tutorials on YouTube, I started my actual floor plan I was working on earlier from scratch. This time I made use of the tips I found online, and the help from the forum. But I’m stuck again at grouping, just as before.
So I have an outer wall, an air gap, inner wall and some insulation against the wall. I wanted to have them all in my model because it makes it more clear what the actual wall is made off. I was able to make all of the walls, but when grouping them, I’m unsure whether I should only add the face, both lines (or side faces in 3D?), or a single line.
What I did was triple click while holding shift to select all the outer walls first, then group them and tag them. Then again for the other wall and insulation. However, I’ve noticed when going in 3D (by pulling up), the side faces of the inner wall belongs to the insulation or vice-versa. Also another thing I’ve noticed, the line in between the inner wall and the insulation is “shared”. So which tag/group would this belong to to make sense? Or should I actually draw 2 lines there?
Attached is my file, feel free to ask more information as needed. updated.skp (396.5 KB)
I can only tell you what I do (and I think a number of others).
Trying to show every component of a sandwich construction gets tricky. So I just show the overall wall thickness as a single element. That makes it easy to amend, put openings in, etc.
When I want to show what the wall is made of, I make a section, then Group from Slice, then add the detail to that 2D group.
Had trouble following your workflow from your description.
That in mind, I would model first, say, the outer wall first as loose geometry - don’t model any other elements of the building yet - select all the loose geometry of the outer wall then group it and tag it.
Then move onto the next building element doing the same.
You have loose geometry and geometry within groups that are not on the default untagged tag. You shouldn’t be doing this - only tag groups and components.
Thank you for the responses! As I understand, should I remove everything from groups (explode them), put everything back on the untagged tag, pull everything down (1 pixel high), and then start again grouping everything?
Because I’ll still have the issue of the middle line in between two walls (which I would like to keep separate). I’m just not sure how it’s usually done, having two separate walls that share a line.
Within a context (eg group or component) you can hide edges with the eraser tool (watch the statusbar on the bottom left for modifying keys).
These changes will be unaffected if you [menu] Edit > Unhide All while editing the ‘model’ level.
I don’t want the line/edge to be removed/hidden. I need to have two separate groups (do I need them in separate groups though?) with each group having the shared line (which isn’t possible I believe?).
Nope. A face needs edges, that’s the main reason why it is recommended to leave the active tag ‘Untagged ‘
If you don’t, things go haywire (you think you are isolating a face, but it will take the edges as well when grouping stuff)
SketchUp draws edges, when they form a loop in the same plane, it will create a face for you.
I got that, but I was of the impression that I could tag each wall/piece. So I think I’ll just leave everything untagged and ungrouped and pull all the walls up to the correct height, right? Any idea what would be the easiest to create windows/doors through multiple walls?
It’s mostly as a floor plan (2D), but I was thinking if I have a 3D model of it, I could still have 2D construction documents using Layout and have windows and door openings at the exact height. But I’m guessing I’ll just stick to 2D as it’s a lot easier (for me) and use 2D drawings for windows and doors. I’m trying to pull everything back down but it’s hard, I’m not sure what the default height of an edge is in SketchUp. 0,1 CM while working in centimeters?
There are a number of ways to do what you want to do modelling-wise.
For me I use Curic extensions to help me model where I have multi groups and nested groups and I’m not saying go and buy their plugin and you will be good to go. It seems to me that you need to get more proficient with SketchUp.
You can use components to ‘cut’ into groups - so you could have a window component cut it’s own hole in a wall but it’s not a technique I use and I’m not sure it it can cut a multi group of wall layers (?).
As Simon suggested above, perhaps you should just model the wall as one group and then do your detail editing in Layout…?
I mostly always model walls as a single object because at 1:100 or 1:50 I don’t really want to be showing any more level of detail. For my 1:20 / 1:10 / 1:5 I will actually draw the detail in layout using the SketchUp model as a template - I have a collection of pre-drawn Layout details that I use.
Sometimes I might model a wall as an outer and inner leaf (I won’t model any cavity insulation). Other times if I want to understand how something is going to be constructed I will create more detailed models.
There’s lots of educational resource about - e.g. check out:
Ok, thank you all so much for the help! Instead of pulling my walls back down I notice I can also remove the top parts, which is quicker and leaves only one face at the bottom instead of 2 I’m guessing when I pull them down?
If you have a collection of connected loose geometry you can create groups from it without the created group ‘taking with it’ shared geometry with the rest of the ungrouped geometry…
Thank you all so much, I really appreciate the help. I was able to move everything back down, and go completely 2D again. I’ll add doors and windows with some extensions I found. I attached the updated version, please take a look if you want and let me know if anything seems wrong/odd so I know I’m on the right track . updated.skp (348.1 KB)
So I put my guides there, then triple click the yellow face, hold SHIFT while moving it outside the face to copy it. I then select the face that’s still there (original) and delete it. I can see the edges stay, which is good. I move the copy back in.
But now when I move the copy again alle the connected edges move with it again. So to me it seems putting the copy back does not change anything? Or do I need to make a group so it will stay as its own and not “connect” the edges? Also, what would be the benefit for doing this in 2D?
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