A neutral 3d extrusion tool

[Anonymous]

I often find myself limited by the existing tools of Archicad : walls and beams can be used to do a lot of different things but I think a neutral extrusion tool, capable of creating simple or complex extrusions in 3D would be a really powerful addition.

Here's a few details about this possible tool :
- works with a reference line like every tools
- the reference line can be closed
- the reference line can be drawn in 3d (it doesn't need to be planar like walls)
- you can use simple geometries (rectangle or circle) or complex profiles
- you can choose if you want to activate materials intersection or not (this is something I would absolutely love!!! )

Here's some simple use cases :
- We sometimes need quantities that we cannot extract directly from the model so we have to "measure" directly in the model. To do this, we like to "draw" the measurement so we can have a schedule and an illustrating drawing. If we use walls or beams, we need to handle layers intersections numbers very carefully and this can be a real problem maker. If we use the railing tool, we cannot put holes in it, it's more difficult to cut, modify, ... This new tool would let us do this without interfering with the model and we could do this in 3d, and not only in plan.
- You could model complex things like roads or edges without the limitations of the railing tool.
- People often struggle to detach themselves from the name of each tools. They draw walls with the wall tool and beams with the beam tool. This new extrusion tool would be universal and could be used to model a lot of things.

I don't have any more example for now but I will add some in the future.

What do you think? Do you have any example where a tool like this would be useful? Would you add something more to this tool?

Johan

[Karl Ottenstein]

How would this differ from the existing Morph tool?

[strangeday]

In the things that mostly lack the Morph Tool….the parametrics!...so when we need to change the position of a node of the rail….or modify the profile used we could do easily, and not deleting the work done and restarting with pipe...this seems to me the proposal….absolutely useful I've to add(even if with railing tool in some way there is a sort of work around)

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

Exactly, the morph tool is great when you don’t need it to be parametric.
It could become a great addition to all the existing tools. The fact that it would be “neutral” means that it could have many flexible functionalities.
Edit : this tool would be a perfect combination with the new complex profile attribute introduced in AC22.

[Anonymous]

I believe you can achieve what you want using the railing tool. Use a profile for the top rail and turn off all posts, balusters, panels etc you can then draw extrusion and edit extrusion or its path
Regards
Scott

[Anonymous]

Yes, you can do a lot with the railing tool but it is too complicated and not flexible enough for a lot of uses.
What I am looking for is a mis between the wall and beam tools : a reference line with each segment independant (you canot simply delete a segment of a railing, you need to redraw it) and the ability to choose wether or not I want it to make materials intersection without having to use Solid Element Operations.

[Anonymous]

This could be the same Morph Tool, just enhanced. Morph Tool is powerful but it could be super powerful with some enhancements. All this things that you ask can be added to the morph tool as functionalities.

[DGSketcher]

This could have been achieved with the new beam tool if only GS had allowed for a 90 degree incline.

With the beam you can create fillets, (ideal for conduits), but the only way to make the beam vertical is to loose the simple geometry and convert it to a morph as columns don't allow filleting.

I have added a new wish which supports this but is more relevant to the latest AC23 release... https://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=307730#p307730

[jl_lt]

This is an interesting topic. Sometimes i think that what stops Archicad or Revit from degenerating into generic modellers is precisely these tools names; otherwise we could achieve almost anything with extrusions and other operations, like most of us did in autocad 3d and other 3d modellers. This way, these BIM programs kind of forces us to think in real world situations, elements and constructions processes (Revit much more than Archicad), contrary to generic 3d modellers where its easy to abuse of boolean operations that oftentimes dont have a parallel in the real world and its one of the reasons why i think GS refuse to allow for SEO to project on plan.

An universal tool of this kind has been proposed in another forum. Personally, while a do like that each tool has a name (it helps for conventional buildings), i think i could get used very quickly to a conceptual change from "wall and column" to "vertical element", Slab to "horizontal flat element", beams and any kind of profile to "extruded profile element", curtain walls and railings to "panelling", etc, I guess at the end of the day what should matter is the information within the object and how it relates to the whole, and not how you got that object.

[Hmooslechner]

something like this which i scripted in 2014 - but it cant make arcforms - just a straight-segmentet tube in 3D

https://bimcomponents.com/GSM/Details/20010


ore something like this bit its still buggy and i dont find the bug: