Hi,
Im having a similar problem except its not working to place the rectangle on my surface, thats because the guidelines i made with the tp m tool are also slightly off surface and the shapes are magnetizing to that. Please see attached photo.
any ideas:)?
Draw the rectangle on the surface rather than drawing one and trying to place it on the surface. That’s about all I can think of, not having the model to investigate. The rectangle does not appear to be aligned to the surface behind it, since one edge appears to be tighter to the surface than the opposite edge.
Secondly, try drawing in perspective instead of parallel projection, I think you’ll find it’s easier.
I have found rather annoying that when I try to draw on a surface it will snap to guides and actually be ON TOP of the guides. Oddly enough, sometimes this happens to where it then draws on the guide, not on the surface and sometimes it draws on the surface.
I am having a hell of a time putting windows in a building I am working on. I’d be more than happy to upload the skp file except that it’s almost 700 megs and guessing people wouldn’t be happy about that. And since my computer is built for doing insane graphics processing and such and still takes minutes to load the file. And takes a bit after every single action. This is even with everything hidden except the actual walls of the building.
However, I am having this issue and it’s damned annoying. I spent quite literally HOURS and HOURS getting some of the doors to cut through some of the walls. Sometimes having to actually destroy the walls, make the door opening and then build up the wall around the door.
I can make a rectangle on the green plane. Push it through to 4.5" so I have a correctly thick wall. Draw a rectangle on it and cut out the door. Sometimes. Other times I do exactly the same thing, and it looks like the above picture as far as the rectangle (for the window or door) is obviously on a different plane than the wall. OR, if it isn’t, I make it, go to push it through and it will NOT. Either it will not push ALL the way through (far wall piece is somehow on a NOT same plane (green)) or the starting side isn’t. Even though it was drawn on it.
I have drawn a rectangle on a plane, then drawn a rectangle for a window/door and when I select inside it to push it out the entire wall is selected. Meaning the window/door is NOT on the same plane. But there is no reason it shouldn’t be. Start and finish said “on surface” when I drew it. OR, now that solid rectangle I created as the wall to start with is in many segments. IE, I click on it and it’s now selecting as many triangles. WTF???
A model that should have taken me a day or two to finish has taken me weeks. Because I have been dealing with these segmented walls. Not kidding when I say that literally one door took me about 9 hours to finally make it. The wall around it (was going around a window and a door) had to be created in like 9 parts. Sometimes I could erase the lines between the parts and sometimes I could not. Having to hide them instead.
I can post some pics if I need to make this more clear…but guessing most others have seen this at some time since I see it all the time and have for years. Just never had a project this important that I felt the need to inquire about it. But this project is so large (in scope and file size) and with only a few windows standing between me and it being finished I find I must ask…WTF??? 
And yes, to put all the info out there…I have double checked every rectangle for placement and plane as I made them. Just to be sure… As I found the ‘snapping’ issue way back when I started this that was making some walls NOT on the correct plane.
How about sharing your model so we can see exactly what you are working with?
And please complete your profile with SketchUp version/license type.
The model is huge. It will not allow me to upload it.
Upload it to Drop Box and share the link.
Will do as soon as I get home…
Here is the file.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vcm-mIDfGYr3nx7eDu4s55mhVcP8EbBE/view?usp=sharing
Here is a picture of the current wall I am having issues with. Note, I have created a rectangle ON THE FACE of the wall, yet when I select inside the rectangle the entire wall is selected. As if the rectangle isn’t really on the face. You can see it boxed from the inside of the wall. And from inside I can push/pull it but you can never get a hole created. I noticed that when I move around a bit from the outside looking at the rectangle there are times that parts of it vanish…as if they are on a plane you can’t see from that angle.
A couple add-on questions that I have not seen anywhere…
Is there a way to force any surface to be a true flat surface on a plane? In other words, if I make a wall and have an idea that maybe it’s off by 1 micron from being true is there a method for selecting its face and telling the program to put it on the correct plane (ie, flat (horizon) like a table or up and down like a wall)
Any clue as to why sometimes my walls segment into many triangles? I have destroyed most of them so I don’t have a screenshot of the thing but others must have witnessed this as it has happened to walls I have made for many years on many Sketchup versions.
I have more but it’s 3am and I have to be up at 7am… Thanks much for any and all info / help in this… I really need to finish this so it can be presented to the church body and elders…
Change the style to ‘by axis’, so you can see which edges are aligned with the axes.
Try drawing a wall starting from a rectangle, then use Push/Pull. Don’t forget to make it a Group, so that it doesn’t stick to other raw geometry.
Use Window > Model Info > Statistics > Purge unused. You will clean the file from unused items (from 636 MB you will reach 395 MB).
Thanks greatly!!! In fact, from last to first… I actually did the clean unused items once before. Got it from 1 gig to where it is now. LOL!!! I’ll absolutely do it again.
I have made many components and groups since starting this project. If you saw the hidden objects you would have seen that. However, I never thought to do walls that way. Makes soooo much sense…thank you very much for that tip. I have spend many hours trying to fix walls that I guess attached to other things totally screwing up the geometry. Lesson learned and will do that in the future. I guess I can spend a few hours deconstructing the walls I have now and making them correctly.
In that vain, I want to ask…what would possibly cause my walls to get all goofy and NOT on plane? I ask because I created them on the blue axis and did push push them out to create them. So that is one reason I am at a total loss as to what changed them over time.
Thanks again and well…thanks again!!!
When you do, draw each segment to exact measurements and group immediately after drawing the first rectangle. Always move each wall into position as a group. Edit groups to push pull adjustments and cut openings.
Do you have ‘Length Snapping’ enabled?
If you do turn it off, Window/Model info/Units .
I learned long ago to have that turned off. Double checked and it is off. I did make the walls as you stated to do and it worked great!!! Still a few times it wouldn’t allow me to cut out my doors like you would think to do, however, I was able to cut them all back out by making a smaller opening then just expanding it to the edges.
On that note, I was cutting out the doors IN PLACE. Here is my process:
There were a few times this worked just fine. Others it would not allow the push through. But in those cases I would cut a smaller hole and then simple expand the 4 sides out to the size of the door.
Couldn’t figure out why this behavior occurs (yes, was working inside the group of the wall for cutting.) I have some theories about things being in the way stopping the push/pull but there are times it works perfectly even with something else in the way. So…?
Anyway, my model is so much happier now… Doesn’t take forever to load or save or do anything in now. Was getting very frustrated drawing a line and then waiting 45 seconds or more to have control again. LOL
Thank you!!!
Greg
