5.1 Creating Walls

Estimated Completion Time: 10 minutes

Description

This module demonstrates how to create and insert walls for a basic layout.

Objectives

• Explain what a wall is.
• Describe the the different properties of a wall.
• Demonstrate the different input methods for creating walls.

Additional Resources

• Training Plan 1 accessible from Choose/Create Project > OPEN SAMPLE
• Bearing Envelope Docs

Learning Activity

Watch video and follow along within the Paragon Design App.

Video Transcript:

  Welcome! In this video, we'll be creating Walls for a basic layout in the Paragon Design App.

For this demo will be referring to Training Plan 1, which is a 30 foot by 20 foot rectangular structure with a four twelve roof slope and gables on both ends. For reference, a copy of the completed Training Plan 1 project is accessible from the Choose Create Project menu, and then under Open Sample.

Let's begin with creating a wall. Walls may represent elements in the layout that can carry loads, such as walls, beams, or columns. To add a wall, click Create from the Actions Toolbar and select Wall. This opens the Wall Creation dialog in the right sidebar where you can define wall properties.

For additional information on creating Walls visit our Paragon Documentation site.

Set the top of the wall to 8 feet. Next we will set the thickness to three and a half inches. The four walls will be structural, so make sure this is selected. We’ll keep the justification to the front edge, since we’ll be inputting the Walls in a counterclockwise fashion, though clockwise input is perfectly acceptable. While you have the option to insert roof planes during wall creation, we’ll leave this unchecked for now.

Once everything is set, you're ready to insert the first Wall. There are two methods for creating Walls, one is Direction plus Length and the other is Point Selection. Let’s start with the Point Selection method. Here we will enter in our Left Point. Let's enter 0 for the X Corrdinate, and 0 for the Y Coordinate. Then Press Enter.

If we move our mouse around we can see that we have the base point for our x and y coordinates at 0 0. Then we will define the end of the line by using the Direction plus Length method. For the Length we will enter 30 feet into the Length box. When adding the lengths, pay attention to how you enter the values. You can use 30, dash 0, dash 0, or 30 and a period, would represent 30 feet.

For the direction we have the option to click on the arrows or we can press the arrow keys on the keyboard. We want this line to go right or counterclockwise. So we would press the right arrow key. Because we’ll be creating additional Walls, we will select Insert and Repeat. You’ll notice that dimensions are automatically placed along with the wall.

Continue with the remaining Walls. On your keyboard Press the Up arrow, and then enter 20 feet. Next click on Insert & Repeat. Press the Left arrow with your mouse or keyboard, and enter 30 feet. This time, let's press the Enter key which executes Insert & Repeat. Which reduces mouse movement, and saves a click. With Point Selection, you can simply click a point on the layout to place the wall. To aid in point selection, the Active Snaps dialog appears which acts as a filter for available snaps. We’ll be Snapping to another Wall, so make sure our Wall options are checked. Select the snap point, then click on Insert and Close to complete the process.

That looks great! Let's take a quick look at our walls in 3D. Select the 3D Camera icon. Here we can see the walls in 3D view. We can spin the view around by pressing down on the right mouse button and move the mouse around. If needed you can also pan around by pressing down on the left mouse button.

That will do it for an introduction to creating walls. Thanks for watching, and see you in the next one!