Hello I designed this for my wife who asked for a trellis for her outdoor plants or whatever. The design calls for wood that is 2" in both dimensions. The species that I am considering, cypress, I just found out is only available locally with a 1.5" maximum thickness. Is there a SketchUp function to rapidly resize all these pieces such that the overall height and width of the finished trellis remains the same? Obviously the 34 horizontal pieces’ lengths will be increased, that’s OK. By the way, the particle board pieces on the left will be cut from MDF and used as templates or sizers, whatever they’re called, to facilitate precise positioning of the cypress during assembly.
If you made components of the pieces, when you edit one the other instances are changed as well. Just by looking to an image I can’t tell if you have groups, components or just loose geometry, can you share your file to check how was it modeled?
This design SHOULD only have two pieces, the vertical piece and the horizontal piece. It shoudl only take a few seconds to resize each. If that was not how it was drawn, I woudl recommend crecreating it using two components. Once you create both, it shoudl only be fairly quick to use Move to copy the repeating elements.
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Assuming you did use components for the two different elements, it should be a simple matter with Scale and Push/Pull.
What I show does change the overall width, too. If the overall width needs to stay the same, the easiest thing would be to redo the array of verticals and then stretch the horizontals to fit with Push/Pull.
Friends, thank you, I’m not ignoring you, I worked late tonight and will look at this again in detail tomorrow. Thank you very much for taking the time to reply. I’ll be back in touch tomorrow
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Thank you Fran, Aaron and Dave. That’s exactly how I managed the design, using components. There are only two distinct pieces (not counting the placement forms on the left, or whatever they’re called in the woodworkingsphere). Sizing and moving my components proceeded exactly as Dave showed. And I am thrilled that Dave took the time to re-create my design for the purpose of instruction. That is truly magnificent. Saturday I will order the lumber and next week, while I am off from work, construction will begin. I will earnestly look for 2" thick cypress though. 1.5" pieces might prove to be too flimsy for this project. But good to know I can easily alter the plans in under 90 seconds if needed !
Possessing only a few hand-held power tools at home, I am fortunate to live in a city having a “maker space”. For a monthly fee, members can utilize well-maintained professional equipment. The trellis will be my first piece constructed there. If it comes out well, photos will be uploaded.
Assembly will be glue & screw. Probably will use a Forstner bit so the screw heads are less visible. The outer-most vertical pieces will likely utilize threaded inserts and hanger bolts so hardware is not visible on the outside edges of the vertical pieces on both ends. This will challenge my capabilities since everything has to be centered perfectly. So naturally I will make a test piece first. If the horizontal “cross-members” are not exactly flush (sides even) with the vertical pieces then I’ll just sand until even. The trellis is not going to the Governor’s Mansion with my name on it. It’s going to my wife’s garden. With my name on it.
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Good deal.
I wish I’d saved the trellis file. I was going to show you a quick way to model the spacers if you need them. Sounds like you are good to go.
Modeling the spacers including positioning them correctly as seen above took me about 30 minutes. I am positive that your method would take 1/10th the amount of time. So the next time I design something that would benefit from spacers, I will surely upload a question about this. Thank you again.
I whipped up a new one. Didn’t finish the spacers but I think you’ll get the idea.
You could plug screw holes with face grain plugs.
You could just use a countersink bit on a drill for wood screws, most exterior deck screws would work great. A Forstner bit and a wood screw might leave a large gap around the screw head.
Dave, another wonderful explanation. I will try this on the next model requiring spacers.
MB, I will have to make a test using both types of bits using scrap pieces. Countersink bits will help me in one way - - I already have a set. I would have to buy a Forstner bit. So I’ll decide after everything is purchased, delivered, cut, sanded.