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

Can't substract the curtain wall from the mesh surface

Anonymous
Not applicable
I have created a mesh roof in Rhinoceros 4.0. Then exported it as .3ds file. Run the Archicad 12, and by using the .3ds to GDL object convertor, created a .gsm file out of my .3ds one.

Then I have inserted this .gsm file into the Archicad floor plan.

The problem is that I can not substract the Curtain wall from the roof (this newly created .gsm file) using SEO. Why I can't do that - substracting with upper extrusion the Curtain wall from the roof? When I try doing it, nothing happens. The curtain wall stays as is was.

You can see a preview of the problem here:

http://img529.imageshack.us/i/autobuskastanicaroof.png/

And here is the .pla Archicad 12 file:

http://www.filefront.com/17214280/autobuska_stanica.pla/


Thank you for the help.
11 REPLIES 11
David Maudlin
Virtuoso
nedostizni:

SEO operators need to be solid bodies, and some objects are not. It looks like the object you are importing is not a solid body, but a plane surface. You might try creating an object that has depth and see if that makes a difference.

David
David Maudlin / Architect
www.davidmaudlin.com
Digital Architecture
AC27 USA • iMac 27" 4.0GHz Quad-core i7 OSX11 | 24 gb ram • MacBook Pro M3 Pro | 36 gb ram OSX14
Anonymous
Not applicable
thank you for the answer. By depth, you mean thickness of the surface?
David Maudlin
Virtuoso
nedostizni wrote:
thank you for the answer. By depth, you mean thickness of the surface?
Yes, but I cannot guarantee that creating this form with depth in another application then importing to ArchiCAD will work, it depends on how the form is translated into GDL.

David
David Maudlin / Architect
www.davidmaudlin.com
Digital Architecture
AC27 USA • iMac 27" 4.0GHz Quad-core i7 OSX11 | 24 gb ram • MacBook Pro M3 Pro | 36 gb ram OSX14
Anonymous
Not applicable
Hm, ok then. Is there a way of creating this kind of surface in the Archicad directly?
David Maudlin
Virtuoso
nedostizni :

You can use the Mesh Tool, but it will be laborious. The image below was done by importing a mesh from another project (just to prove the concept), selecting the curtain walls as Targets, the Mesh as Operator, and Intersection as the Operation. The Mesh is on a wireframe layer in this image, it should be hidden.

If you want the Mesh as the roof, then copy the mesh, lower the copy by the depth of the roof, and subtract the upper Mesh from the lower Mesh to create a form of uniform depth.

David
Mesh-SEO.gif
David Maudlin / Architect
www.davidmaudlin.com
Digital Architecture
AC27 USA • iMac 27" 4.0GHz Quad-core i7 OSX11 | 24 gb ram • MacBook Pro M3 Pro | 36 gb ram OSX14
Anonymous
Not applicable
thank you for the reply David Maudin.
But using the mesh tool does not satisfies me as there are not smooth, but linear surface.

I tried with creating the new purple mesh surface in Rhino, but this time with a thickness of 15 centimeters. Exported this mesh surface from Rhino do .3ds file.
Then opened the Archicad, converted the .3ds file to .gsm and inserted it. But the same - nothing happens when I try to substract a curtain wall from this purple mesh surface. Actualy it does, this happens:

I get this message:
Pen number is less than 1 or greater than 255 at line 1 in the Master scriot of file "autobuska_stanica2.gsm"

STOP		CONTINUE
Is there a way to edit the .gsm file so that this error is fixed? Here is the .gsm file:

http://www.filefront.com/17246133/autobuska_stanica2.gsm
David Maudlin
Virtuoso
nedostizni:

I took a look at this object and there is no code in the Master Script, so this may be a translation bug (when I use the object in ArchiCAD 14, there is no error message), I don't see a way to fix the error message within the object's code. When zooming in on this object in section, it appears to have no depth, are you getting the depth you created for this object?

If you are able to get the depth to translate, and this object still does not work with SEO, then you could use a Mesh that roughly follows the contour of this object, remaining between the top and bottom surfaces, use this Mesh for the SEO, then hide the Mesh's layer.

David
David Maudlin / Architect
www.davidmaudlin.com
Digital Architecture
AC27 USA • iMac 27" 4.0GHz Quad-core i7 OSX11 | 24 gb ram • MacBook Pro M3 Pro | 36 gb ram OSX14
Anonymous
Not applicable
You also need to be sure that the part is a solid model and not just surfaces. You can tell this by cutting it with the marquee tool in 3D. If it appears hollow it is a surface model and cannot be an operator in SEO.
Anonymous
Not applicable
Thank you on answers both Mattew and David, and sorry for late reply.

David:
This one (the .gsm) is without depth - thickness, but I also created the one with thickness and still the same result.
Can you explain it to me a bit closer about how to create a mesh with similar shape like surface? I now how to use a mesh tool, and the whole process would probably be to elevate the mesh points in z direction, but still the shape of the surface is complex. Is there a way to create the mesh below the surface and then elevate the mesh points by clicking on the surface?

Mattew:
I just need to select the surface with the marquee tool (but in floor plan, or where?) and then File-->Cut ?