2.4.2- Create the Roof and Attic Walls

Roof Attic - Exterior Walls

You will draw the exterior walls of the roof - attic, using as guide the polyline "Roof outline" (Fig.2.4.2.1), that you have created at the previous lesson 2.4.1.

You can download the drawing of this polyline (kmghk) by clicking here: dwg for Fig. 2.4.2.1. On the website you will be directed, locate the file roof_outline.zip on category Custom Drawings/ Roof - Attic, click on this file name to download it, then unzip and save it in the folder: C:\\ACA\My_projects\house21_155\downloads\roofAttic\, under the name roof_outline.dwg.

Using as guide the roof outline, you will draw the walls with thickness of 0.30 (m) and height 0.60 (m), onto which you step the roof.

• Open, with AutoCAD Architecture, the drawing h21190_roofAttic_outline.dwg that you created in the previous lesson 2.4.1.
• Tool palettes provide the main method for accessing tools to create objects in your model.
  

  The Design Tool Palette includes the basic tools for creating most of the architectural objects. The tools include commands for adding walls, doors, windows, roofs, slabs and more other objects. You can have tools for standard objects as well as for objects with a specific style and properties.
  The tool contains creation parameters for the object it represents. When you add an object with a specific tool, the object has the settings you defined in the tool. When you click an object tool to add an object in the drawing, the properties palette opens and you can change properties for the new object if desired.

• To open the default Tool Palette - Design group:
• On Ribbon, click the tools icon and then on Design Tools tab, (Fig.2.4.2.2), to Open the Tool Palette - Design (Fig.2.4.2.3),

• Right click on the tool Wall and select Apply Tool Properties to > Linework (Fig.2.4.2.3).

• At the prompt 'Select lines, arcs, circles, or polylines to convert into walls:', on your screen select polyline 'Roof Outline' (Fig.2.4.2.1), and press ENTER to accept the selection.
• At the prompt: Erase layout geometry: select No(or type n), and then press ENTER.
  
  The polyline is replaced by the walls, which are the exterior walls of the first floor plan (Fig. 2.4.2.4).

You will notice that the walls are justified to there center with the Roof outline (polyline), you used to create the walls. You have to justify them to their right, to do this:

With the walls selected, on Properties palette and in Category Dimensions click the arrow on Justify tab, and from the drop-down menu select right.

The position of walls will change, as is shown in Fig.2.4.2.5.

The walls consist of one or more elements, which are the items used for their construction.
The walls used in a drawing have elements and attributes defined by the style of the specific wall tool you selected and used to design it.

Properties of the walls

The Properties palette allows you to view and modify the natural and graphic properties of an object you are going to draw or to select on your screen.
Expanding fields of Properties palette, you can view and modify additional properties of an object that you draw or select.

• Select the walls right click on one of them and select Properties. The Properties palette will open, and display the properties of the selected wall (Fig.2.4.2.5).
• Look in the properties palette, you'll notice that the style of the wall is the standard, it is the simplest wall style consisting of only two parallel lines that define the two sides of the wall.
  It is the wall tool you have chosen earlier from the palette of drawing tools to create the walls.
  You will temporarily use this simple style of wall, and later you can replace it with the actual wall style you want to use for the exterior walls of your project.
• In category Dimensions select for Justify the value Right (Fig.2.4.2.5). Now pay attention that :
  The walls will have the dimensions of the actual final wall you are going to use later, 0.30 for Width and 0.60 for Base Height ( all units are in meters).
  The elevation of the walls will be 0.00. It is the level where will be placed the walls.
• To do this: In the Properties palette expand category dimensions and set the value of Width to 0.30 and of Base height to 0.60.
  The walls have changed and now have Width = 0.30 and Base height= 0.60.
• First at the Layers panel click the Layer Properties button and on the Layer Properties Manager dialog box locate layer A-Wall, click on its color and change its color to Magenda. (This is done only for better presentation of the plans.)
• In category Location set Elevation = 0.00.

Roof Attic - interior wall

The final layout of the exterior and interior walls of the Roof Attic will be like the one you see in Fig.2.4.2.5. You will follow the dimensions that you see in this sketch to design the interior walls.

The interior walls will have as width 0.15, (this value is in units, in this project we use the meter as one unit, the value 0.15, means 0.15 meters or 15 cm), as Base Height 0.60, as elevation 0.00.

Before you continue, create a new layer to use for the interior walls, by name A-Wall-Inter, set as color: 113, and make it current (The reason for creating this new layer with color = 113, is to distinguish visually the inner from the exterior walls).

• In Design Tool palette, find the tool Wall (Fig.2.4.2.3) - this tool 'Wall' uses the wall style standard -, click on it to open the panel Properties - Wall (Fig. 2.4.2.5).
• In properties palette (Fig.2.4.2.5),and in category General, you will notice that the Style is Standard. Using the standard style wall, this means that the wall you plan has only one element and consists of only two parallel lines, one right and one left.
• In Properties palette scroll to category Dimensions and set Thickness to 0.15 and Base Height to 0.60.
  These are the dimensions of the real wall that you will use later to replace the 'standard' wall that you used to design the interior walls.
• In category Location set Elevation = 0.00, is the level where the walls will be placed.
• Scroll down on the left side of the panel to find the field Justify. Press the right field, click the arrow that appears on the right, and select right (Fig. 2.4.2.4).
  The justification of the wall determines the side of the wall that we will use as a guide for its placement.

To draw the wall (BD₁), as shown in Fig.2.4.2.5:

With tool Wall selected,   draw the walls (BD₁), in direction from B to D₁.

• At the prompt: Start point or […]: select point B
• At the prompt : End point or […]: select point D₁, and press ENTER.
  The walls (BD₁) designed.
• You have created the interior walls (BD₁) of the roof - attic, which have thickness 0.15 m, Base height 0.60 m, Elevation 0.00 m, and you have set all the interior walls to layer 'A-Wall-Inter' .

If you select the interior wall (BD₁), it's properties will appear in the Properties palette.

• In Properties palette, you will notice that the wall Layer is A-Wall-Inter. Notice also that, the wall style is Standard, Thickness is set to 0.15, Base Height to 0.60, and Justify is set to Right.
• In category Location, the Elevation  is set to 0.00.

The plan of the Roof - Attic, after the design of the exterior and interior walls, will be as shown in Fig.2.4.2.6 (without dimensions).

Press Esc and save your drawing under the name: h21190_roofAttic_walls
 in the folder: C:/ACA/myProjects/house21_155/customDwg/roofAttic

3D Isometric View

To have a 3D isometric view of your project, on the View Cube tool, at the upper right corner of your screen (Fig.2.4.2.9), click on the corner WS of the Cube.

You can apply a Conceptual view in your drawing to have a more artistic view. To do this:

• To set the Visual Style of the drawing, on Ribbon > click on View tab > click the arrow on Visual panel, the drop-down which will open provides a choice of visual styles defined in drawing to make current (for the moment the current visual style is the 2D Wireframe) > select Conceptual, to make this visual style current (Fig.2.4.2.9).
  The result is what you see in Figure 2.4.2.9.

At the next lesson, you will start designing, the roof, according to the layout and dimensions of the polyline 'roofAttic outline' as shown in Fig 2.4.2.1.
During the drawing of the Basement Outline, you gave to point (a) coordinates (20,20) ( X=20, Y=20), and keep in mind that you will use these coordinate values for the same point in all floor plans and site plan you are going to design.