Medeek Wall

It’s great to see that you’re sticking to the ability to customize the layers where the various groups/components will be placed.

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Congratulations! That was fast!

Have you considered adding a stretch goal or two?

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There is no way to officially add a stretch goal within Kickstarter, however one can announce a stretch goal. My concern is to announce a new goal might somehow upset the backers who have already taken the initiative to pledge. There is no harm in the project funding past its goal.

Additional funding beyond the original goal essentially buys me more time that I can devote to programming the plugin.

The first menu for the rectangular wall tool:

I’ve modifed the wall type parameter to include the following (3) options:

Int-Int
Int-Ext
Ext-Ext

I am still thinking about how best to accommodate custom stud sizes. I may make it possible to enter in custom sizes in the global settings so they can be permanently stored. I prefer that the wall dialogues simply show a stud size rather than breaking it down into depth and width, but ultimately those two dimensions are what is being controlled here.

Working on the positioning tool portion, I will borrow from the timber truss module of the truss plugin to accelerate this coding task. Also working on the advanced wall options and its menus etc…

Please let me know if you see something important that I am missing or if something can be made better. I am always open to suggestion.

In the global settings you can enable a 3D preview:

The 2D preview is default, which just shows the footprint of the wall.

Within the global settings and also when you edit a wall you will be able to modify the corner treatment at the start and end of each wall segment, the parameters being:

Corner Stud Qty: 1,2,3,4
Corner Stud Thk. (in.): 1.5 (default), can be user defined to any value
Corner Treatment: California, None, etc…
Corner Angle (deg.): 90, can be user defined, 0 < x < 180
Corner Configuration: End, Outside Corner etc…
Corner Offset (in.): Stud Depth or numeric value (ie. 3.5, 5.5 7.25 etc…)

This will allow the user to utilize any combination of studs or timbers at each corner (ie. a 6x6 post) for a wall segment needing some serious shearwall action.

When you create a wall these three parameters will not be shown and will pass through from the global settings. If a wall needs to be modified then a simple right click and “edit wall assembly” will allow for changing up these settings for either end of the wall segment independently.

If holdowns are enabled then the placement of the holdowns (ie. HDU series) will be modified appropriately to rest against the innermost corner stud surface.

In addition to framed openings (ie. windows and doors) there may also be other misc. items associated with a wall segment:

  • Wall Columns
  • Beam Pockets
  • Additional holdowns/straps for shearwall segments within a given wall
  • Additional framing where a wall meets another wall mid-length (T intersection).

I will give these items some more thought as the development progresses and determine the best way to add these items into the UI.

As I imagined the complexity that can occur when framing a structure only gets more interesting the farther down the rabbit hole I go.

Will it have the ability to generate/use prefab elements?

Prefab elements are really no different from framed elements, so I would say yes.

Global Settings:: Wall Corners:

Within this tab the user can set the defaults for the wall corners.

These same settings can also be set for each wall segment with the “edit wall” tool.

I am now testing the stud placement and top and bottom plates:

So far only the line tool is available but seems to work fairly robustly now.

Please download and comment on the model below:

There are a few minor issues that need further attention:

1.) How to position studs with non-orthogonal walls, I could use some direction on this.
2.) I have California Corners enabled for outside corner and inside corners, what do you do when there is a clash between the nailer and the regular stud layout, see model for examples.
3.) When there is more than one top plate (2,3 etc…) I have them setup to lap each other. However multiple bottom plates do not lap, they are currently setup just to stack.

The items for tomorrow’s programming todo list are:

  • Setup the HTML form and backend for the wall edit feature.
  • Finish cleaning up the global settings, HTML and backend.
  • Further debugging and refinement of the stud placement module.

Future items:

  • Addition of window and door modules (framed openings)
  • Advanced wall options (sheathing, cladding, gypsum, insulation, trim, holdowns etc…)
  • Window and Door Plugin
  • Gable Wall Tool
  • Polyline tool for Rectangular Wall Tool

I’m sure there are plenty of other items that don’t come to mind right this minute, please feel free to pass along any thoughts, comments or suggestions.

We do a lot of 2X6 walls with 2X3 horizontal strapping.

image

We also do offset 2x4 on 2X6 plates

And where it is very cold we do various double wall construction. In this case both bottom plates sit on the foundation. In some cases the outside wall extends beyond the floor. Some plywood is used to strap across window and door openings.

image

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I’m going to start with conventional framing practices first and then once this is solid I will add in other wall framing practices and other more exotic construction techniques.

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Like Gary we use a lot of double wall assemblies and 2x strapping. One capability I would like to see is for cross-strapping, which we use outside for vertical siding (to maintain the drainage plane) and inside in walls and ceilings.

If you allowed for the possibility of 2 layers of strapping (both internal and external) with an orientation parameter (vertical / horizontal) and the ability to set the size used per layer, then every possible combination would be accounted for.

Looking forward to the release of this plugin.

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Send me some models of typical construction using the strapping and I will study it further.

I am not familiar with this construction practice. Most of what I see being built (residential) here Washington State is conventional framing (2x6 walls for the most part) with OSB or Plywood sheathing and gypsum interior cladding.

If I were stick framing an angle like this I’d probably do something like this.

image

2x6 wall.skp (125.1 KB)
Also, I think this was mentioned before, but I’d have the face of the sheathing reflect the building size, not the stud wall.

Shep

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When we use horizontal strapping we make sure that there is strapping at a height that works with kitchen cabinets. Also the vapor barrier is between the strapping and the 2X6 studs. This means we don’t require poly pans etc. for electrical outlets. All outside wall wiring is on the warm side. We also make use of rigid insulation on the outside of the wall.

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I typically design structures so that the face of framing reflects the building size however some people use the face of sheathing as the building size. I will give this some more thought.

Since the sheathing and cladding constitute additional options then it is possible that the user of the plugin does not have a sheathing thickness if they do not enable advanced options. I think what I will do is setup the ability within the advanced options to specify whether to use “face of framing” or “face of sheathing”.

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We take a similar approach. There are no electrical/plumbing penetrations of the (smart) vapour retarder. We use either rigid insulation or 1 1/2" Eco4 as thermal break for structural members on external wall (Eco 4 has advantages of acting as sheathing, and of being more vapour-open as well as more enviro-friendly)

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We use face of Eco4 sheathing (see comment above) / rigid insulation as the reference and line it up with the face of the foundation insulation to ensure a continuous thermal break. This way measurements reflect all the critical elements of the of the wall structure (at each level) and makes it easier for layout. Anything outboard of the Eco4 is exterior finish and non-critical in dimension.

Which brings me to ask whether you had included an exterior insulation layer (apart from the cavity insulation)?
For our typical assembly, I can just spec the sheathing @ 1 1/2", but there are cases where I’ll add an additional layer of ComfortBoard over top. Here in Quebec, EPS over OSB is pretty standard practice for more conventional builders.

In such cases, again we’d want to be able to use the face of the rigid insulation layer as the critical line for perimeter measurement.

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Since the face of sheathing actually may be the face of insulation, it may be more useful to just have an user driven offset that can be set, and this number may include the thickness of the sheathing and insulation (or whatever other wall cladding or barriers present).

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