Missing Piers

[Curtis Johnson]

BB:

Do you have all the layers you need on selected in Layer Display Options. I can get a footing (pier) to generate under a post without terrain within the perimeter of a building, but I have to use the 3D full overview camera to peak under the floor to see it, unless I change its properties so that the top of the pier is above the floor surface. If you use your camera tools you should be able to see everything you've done if you have the proper layers checked for display.

[dshall]

................ I can get a footing (pier) to generate under a post without terrain within the perimeter of a building, but I have to use the 3D full overview camera to peak under the floor to see it, unless I change its properties so that the top of the pier is above the floor surface. If you use your camera tools you should be able to see everything you've done if you have the proper layers checked for display.

Nice Curtis, you are absolutly correct, WITHIN a building you get the footings. Now the question is how do you control the TOP HT. location of the footing.

[Curtis Johnson]

Scott:

BUT ... I just went into the database article and set up the defaults the same as in the article. Now, when I place a post within the building, I get no footings under the posts. It doesn't matter if the structure is called a slab, a garage or a porch (all with slab floors), I get no piers under the posts. The footing tops can be set in the Framing Defaults > Posts & Beams dbx.

[bbuilders]

Scott:

BUT ... I just went into the database article and set up the defaults the same as in the article. Now, when I place a post within the building, I get no footings under the posts. It doesn't matter if the structure is called a slab, a garage or a porch (all with slab floors), I get no piers under the posts. The footing tops can be set in the Framing Defaults > Posts & Beams dbx.

So I'm not crazy...

[Curtis Johnson]

Spencer:

No, I don't think so ... at least not that I can tell ... or we're related. I just put a quick terrain in my test. I can place a post with pier outside the model but not within it (just a post is placed within the structure). I didn't set any terrain height values with respect to the building and it appears that the pier gets its top height from the terrain (I think ...) regardless of my "top up to floor" setting of 4". It's more like 2 inches without monkeying with the terrain values.

I don't have any more time to mess with this. I am either totally missing something (and you) or there's a major flaw in the Help article or in Chief. I am beginning to think that maybe there was a terrain in the help article they forgot to mention but ???? I would suggest you contact Tech Support and get them to reproduce their piers without a terrain or admit there should be one. At least that's what I am thinking at this time. Still confused about how I could place the post with piers inside the building and now I can't????

Please report back here after you talk to TS (or did you already??). I have got to get working on a plan. Out of here.

[dshall]

.......................and it appears that the pier gets its top height from the terrain (I think ...) .....................

I am not sure about this, very confusing, spent 30 minutes trying to figure this out, don;'t get it, who cares, be able to do things manually and you can get what you want........ I would love to one day challenge CA on the every day challenges we face...... I would blow them away.......... or maybe not......... again this is the kind of crap that ticks me off, I face this stuff daily, and I have learned to get around it, but I do not know if CA appreciates some of the custom situations that we deal with every day,

[Curtis Johnson]

Scott:

You are right .... the top of the pier footings are exactly 6" above the height of the terrain when initially placed.

[dshall]

Scott:

You are right .... the top of the pier footings are exactly 6" above the height of the terrain when initially placed.

Unless you are putting the posts/footings within the foundation (at level zero).

[Glenn Woodward]

Spencer,

A couple of basics.
Firstly, you can forget about the terrain if you want - it's not mandatory to have one.
Having said that, I recommend you use one as it allows you to easily control the height of the footing.
When you click to place the post and footing, I assume you are on level 1?

If you try to place the post and footing on level 1, you only get a post.

You only get a footing with the post when you place the post on the lowest floor of a building AND if you place it inside the building.

Go down to floor zero and try and place a post whilst dragging your cursor inside and outside the building and see what happens.

But, if you have a terrain, it makes it all a little easier because you can place the post AND footing outside the building, but within the terrain, and the terrain determines the footing height.
And if you have a terrain built, you are not restricted to placing the post and footing on the lowest floor level (unless that is where you terrain is built).

Simple and straight forward, isn't it?

[Curtis Johnson]

Glenn/Scott:

You nailed how to place a post with a pier without having a terrain .... go to floor zero. Simple, straight forward ... definitely ... if you are on Floor 0. I was able to initially place a post and footing within the building's perimeter on Floor 1 but when I went back and changed the setup defaults to what was used in the article ... and built the foundation, I could no longer do it while on Floor 1.

I, like Spencer, find it hard to believe the Chief guys would write a 41 page detailed help article on how to create pole barns and skip mentioning the part that you had to be on floor zero for the post/pier placement to work absent a terrain. The article makes no mention of their being a terrain nor do they suggest building a terrain before attempting to build a pole barn using the described procedures. On page 9 of the article is an image of the main level of the pole barn after placement of a garage door. The next immediate step is "To place the posts" in which there is no mention of going to floor zero to place the first post with a footing. If you place your post and footing close to a corner as suggested in the articleIn step number 9 on page 12 is the next image of the pole barn which is a Floor 1 image. No where in all the steps up to this point is there any mention of going to Floor 0 to place posts or footings.

It appears that everything is being done while on Floor 1. Seems a little strange to me unless there's some simple procedure that I and Spencer have totally missed within the article. I have discovered that I can place a post with footing in the interior of the building IF I don't build the foundation after creating the Floor 1 walls. With no foundation built, I can then easily place the posts and footings as described (but you can only place them within the interior of the building) in the article. However, once I have built the foundation, I no longer have the ability to place a post with a footing (while working from Floor 1). It is interesting that in looking at the images of the pole barn in the article, it doesn't appear that there is a footing built ... it only looks to me like there's a slab there setting on top of the piers. If the intent of the article was to not have a mono slab with a 16 x 8 footing, then why even mention it in the article?

I am pretty sure the work is to be done from Floor 1 because there's no mention in the article of having to turn on the reference display set with wall layers checked, which is the only way you could use the point to point move tool to place a post and footing on the main layer (girt layer) while on Floor 0. Without the reference display set on, you would have to do a Transform/Replicate move in two directions (1.5 inches in the X and Y directions) to the inboard side(s) in order to get the post inside of the girts if you did the pt. to pt. move to an outside foundation corner. It wouldn't make sense to do a pt. to pt. move of the post to an inside corner of the foundation footing since the footing is 16" wide per the article and a subsequent big move would be required to get the post against the girts.

I guess the only way Spencer or I will be able to resolve our questions about the procedures used in the article is for one or both of us contact Tech Support and see what they say. If they admit to skipping something or screwing up the directions that were printed, then all is well and we can move on to more wonderment somewhere else in our Chief experiences. If they tell us to figure it out on our own, then we march on ...... until the hiccups start again ... then we start another thread and see if a fellow Chiefer or two can point us in the right direction. If TS shows/tells us how we screwed up a procedure that was right in front of our noses (couldn't see the forest for the trees sort of thing), then we just make a mental note that all is normal and we live happily ever after.

[Glenn Woodward]

Curt et al,

I think the reason for the confusion relates to the fact that the article was written in relation to an earlier version and never updated (even though Chief says it relates to X5).

I went back to previous versions and had a play.
Things change with X4.

The proceedure described in the article works Ok with X3 and earlier.
In X3, you can place a post and footing on level 1 (only within the building though), even though there is a mono slab on level 0 and no terrain.

With X4 and X5 this same operation does not work.
It may have something to do with the introduction of true mono slabs with X4 - sounds sort of logical to me.

I notice that Spencer is using X4 and hence the problems.

Chief needs to update the article to take account of the changes made with X4 - whether they were changes to the mono slab tool or some other reason relating to the treatment of level 0.
Or, alternatively, Chief needs to change the way the tool works back to like it did before X4.

[Curtis Johnson]

Glenn:

Why didn't I think of that. I remember Chief coming out with the original pole barn article, as you said, several years ago. I think I even printed it as pole barns are extremely common out west, including the one I had built. I think that should wrap this up. Thanks for providing me with some closure on this. This can be written off as something that slipped through the cracks. With some understanding of how the program works, issues such as this can be overcome if a user is persistant and/or ingenious enough to use other methods. The problem is that we are all wanting to do things the easy way, if one exists. Thanks for your GREAT detective work. I will recommend you for the CSI cast.

[bbuilders]

Curt,

Thanks for taking a deeper look into this article. I am glad that I am not the only one that encountered problems. I did have the thought last night that Glenn proposed but I lacked earlier versions to test that out.

I have not had a chance to work on it since Scott posted his video as more pressing things came up. I plan on contacting TS to let them know of the error, although I am sure they have plenty more to do.

Thanks again for everyone's help!

[Anne]

Hi All,

It looks like one of the steps in the article is out of order. The posts will be placed with footings as long as they're created before the foundation is built - not after, like the article states.

Sorry about the mistake in the article and for the confusion it caused - we will get it corrected right away.

[Anne]

One more observation - if there's no foundation present, the footings will build below the floor structure as it's currently specified. So, one of the steps for setting up defaults should be to check "Monolithic Slab Foundation" in the Floor 1 Defaults dialog.