topic Re: STRUCAD in Collaboration with other software

STRUCAD

Anonymous — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 07:31:48 GMT

Anyone come across / had experience with Strucad.

I have a contractor trying to export a steel frame model as an IFC but they keep getting errors, when I try to search for more info I can't seem much information about this software.

What's the next best format to try and export to for import into Archicad 11 ?

Re: STRUCAD

cgrimley — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 16:43:09 GMT

Our firm had a similar problem with one of our steel suppliers. We tried using IFC but that was too much. Try this: have them save as a .dwg, then in your archicad model do File>Libraries & Objects>Open Object, then select the .dwg file (be sure to change the 'File Type' to dwg) and that will make it a gdl object that you can then place in your model.
It has worked like a charm for us. Although I'm not sure what software our steel supplier uses.

Good Luck

Casey Grimley

Re: STRUCAD

Anonymous — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 19:12:51 GMT

For now IFC and DWG are the only ways to bring the structural models into ArchiCAD (3DS, SKP, etc. are other options but they are not functionally different from DWG).

IFC is typically slower to process but will produce a more useful result when it works. IFC will import individual detectable and (to varying degrees) editable elements. The DWG approach will provide one big complex model with no ability to snap to or measure any of the component parts. It can also be a bit of a trick to get it placed precisely in the correct location.

Re: STRUCAD

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 07:56:46 GMT

Whilst I have imported a 3D dwg as an object before I have had problems with scaling and the whole steelwork frame becomes "one" but I need to have it to break it down for construction sequencing.

I've got round this Strucad problem by opening the 3D dwg into Autocad (sorry!) and then exporting it as an IFC then opening it as an IFC in Archicad 12 and to be honest it looks pretty good ! Right down to the nuts and bolts. Got there in the end.