Modeling
About Archicad's design tools, element connections, modeling concepts, etc.

Trapezoidal Wall

Anonymous
Not applicable
Having trouble creating a wall elevation - 3 storey building - external wall is 200mm thick, 7200mm wide at the top storey and tapers to 4200mm at the ground floor slab - very new at ArchiCAD - how do I create a tapered wall like this? Talk real slow please as I'm a slow reader. Thanks.
11 REPLIES 11
Ingolf
Advocate
How to make a "conic" wall, an Australian new member asked today (Can't find the question, but remember it). A "conic" wall that is 7200mm long at the top and just 4200mm long at the bottom. This wall should reach over three Floors and can therefore be 9000mm high. (But the Wall may still be made on a single floor).

Use a mixture of Complex Walls and ordinary Walls. Make first a Complex Profile that is tilted 1500mm to one side and 9000mm high. Place a wall with this Complex Profile on the Floor Plan by making an U-Wall (seen from the top).

Then ungroup the Walls. Make the middle Wall straight. Drag both the two Side Walls in towards the Middle Wall and stop when the Side Walls are 1mm long, and therfore almost invisible....(OK, I admit a little cheating here)

Then you have a straight Wall with sloped sides, a "conic" Wall.

(All free stuff from my soon-to-come books on ArchiCAD)
Ingolf Sundfør, Bricklayer, Author of several Real Life Problem Solving Books for Archicaddicts in Norway.
PC/i7/W11/ArchiCAD 6.5-27
Brett Brown
Advocate
Why do you not just use the slanted wall to do this?
Imac, Big Sur AC 20 NZ, AC 25 Solo UKI,
Barry Kelly
Moderator
S o u n d s l i k e y o u n e e d S E O
My attempt at humour (sorry)

As you want to taper the wall along it's length you would probably want to add a roof plane at the angle required and then either Trim To Roof or use a Solid Element Operation to cut away the part you don't want.

If you use TTR then you can delete the roof plane but any amendments will have to be untrimmed and then re-trimmed.

If you use SEO then just hide the roof in a layer that is never shown.
Then if amendments are needed you can just move the roof around.

Either way the plan representation will not be correct as TTR and SEO do not affect the plan view.


Another way would be to creat a complex profile in the shape you want to see in elevation and then make the wall just 200mm long.
You will get a true representation in plan this way if you use the Projected With Overhead setting for the wall.
However you will not be able to place doors and windows as the wall will be drawn sideways (along its width and not its length).


I would got for one of the first methods and simply add a white solid fill to the various floor plans to hide the various lengths of wall that should not be shown.

Barry.
One of the forum moderators.
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Anonymous
Not applicable
Ingolf,

The original question was here - http://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=154321

I've linked back to this one!
Karl Ottenstein
Moderator
Thanks, Peter. I merged the answer into the question thread.

Karl
One of the forum moderators
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Ingolf
Advocate
Several good suggestions here...
A lot of creativity on this Forum, I must say!
The original question is good and addresses a weakness in ArchiCAD. This is one of the few instances that Revit surpasses ArchiCAD (along with dimensioning). In ArchiCAD we shold be able to make a Wall excectly the way we want it - in an Elevation. Draw the wall as a Free Form in the Elevation Window with the Line Tool and transform it to a Wall with the Magic Wand... But that is unfortunately not possible.... yet.
And while I am on to ArchiCADs potential. It should be possible to copy (not just move) elements and objects in Section/Elevation.
Ingolf Sundfør, Bricklayer, Author of several Real Life Problem Solving Books for Archicaddicts in Norway.
PC/i7/W11/ArchiCAD 6.5-27
Anonymous
Not applicable
Barry wrote:"S o u n d s l i k e y o u n e e d S E O"
I like that. Sounds like a Super Hero to the rescue.


Hello Ingolf,
who wrote:"Free Form in the Elevation Window with the Line Tool and transform it to a Wall with the Magic Wand..."
That would be great!
However until then, since I had not seen the "conic" wall trick before, I tried it out, with a slight modification of plumbing (Latin: plumbum) up the outside walls with a little SEO action using 4' diam columns.

Then had a hell of a time trying to add my C.P. of Vrustic wall to the lower slanted section.
As you can see I sort of got it, but can't get walls to join properly, especially [1].
When I try some joining, pieces of conic wall start disappearing.
Have faked it a bit and could do more fakery if I had the time, or it was a real client.
Is there a way to join this screwball walls easily that I don't understand?
Or is fakery the the best trick?
And by the way, Thank you very much Ingolf!
lec
Ingolf
Advocate
Helo lec1212!

What an unusual customer! This resembles a boat? Tell us more about your exciting assignment and the need for slanted walls on the sides of the house (cottage?) and just 1 meter up.
Ingolf Sundfør, Bricklayer, Author of several Real Life Problem Solving Books for Archicaddicts in Norway.
PC/i7/W11/ArchiCAD 6.5-27
Ingolf
Advocate
Hello lec1212!

Reading your message once more I see that you don't have any client...OK...but a fantasy project still gives food for thought!
If you use my recipe earlier in this thread, you will see that the use of Complex Walls rather than Solid Element Operations (SOE) makes your task possible. Make a double slanted Wall 45 degrees and then 135 degrees (if that is what you want). Look at the attached Image.

Then choose the Complex Wall and draw it in an U-shape.
Ungroup
Make the middle Wall a straight Wall with a thickness of for instance 200mm
Place Door and Window.
Good luck!
PS: SOE doesn't work very well in an IFC model ...just so that you know to use SOE with modesty...
Ingolf Sundfør, Bricklayer, Author of several Real Life Problem Solving Books for Archicaddicts in Norway.
PC/i7/W11/ArchiCAD 6.5-27