Final SketchUp attempt

[John Leech]

For some unknown reason, I've decided on one last attempt to learn how to use SketchUp. All my previous attempts can best be described as marvelous failures. They even resulted in me cancelling at least one WW magazine subscription when the magazine seemed in my mind to switch primarily to SketchUp plans.

Long story short, my daughter and I are going to build a small trebuchet for a school project. I've found a rather simple SketchUp plan that seems to be an easy build, but I can't seem to figure out how to break the plan down into components to determine how to build. Were I to build from just looking at the diagram, we'd be halfway done. I find this very frustrating.

So, ultimately, my question is how does everybody use sketchup to find dimensions of the components and then create a process to build from?

thanks,
John

[Ben Rivel]

I dont use SketchUp, but my understanding of how people do was that unless whoever drew the model took the time to layout all the pieces separately in a separate drawing making a "cut list drawing" the only way to build from the drawing was to take all or look at the measurements from withing the drawing itself to determine/make your own cut list.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

John,

If for some reason Dave Richards doesn't reply to this thread, don't hesitate to PM via his member name here at SMC. He's very generous with helping people with Sketchup. He's an all around nice guy too!

[Garth Almgren]

I've found Jay Bates' SketchUp videos and articles (http://jayscustomcreations.com/sketchup/) extremely helpful when it comes to learning how to use SketchUp for woodworking.

For example, he has one video where he draws a sofa table then shows how he breaks down the parts and lays them out on the dimensional lumber that he will be using for the project. The layout stuff starts at about the 13:00 mark but the entire video is definitely worth watching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eOBU2vtDvM

Another good one is his mission-style coat rack. Layout steps (including adding dimensions) start at about 8:22 in the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIkgqScb4sY

[Chris Padilla]

The key to Sketch-up is to create Groups or Components. In this way, pieces are individualized and not 'stuck' to other pieces. This is likely where most of the frustration of beginners is with Sketch-Up.

I've learned from Dave Richards to use the Move tool A LOT. Start with a block and start to lay out lines and such of your project to bring out details like doors and individual parts like stiles and rails and even molding and such. Don't worry about the inside and joinery and such just yet. Just get the external stuff roughed out.

To create the actual individualized parts, you need to select just that part, click Move, and click Ctrl and copy that part out from the drawing to separate it. This will now allow you to further refine it AND make it a component. What is cool is that as you work on this part disconnected from your block, the part on the block will take on the properties of the disconnected part. Once you are done, delete the disconnected part and now your block has that part done and individualized and no longer 'stuck' to the geometry of its surrounding part. Keep doing this and your block now becomes a bunch of individualized pieces.

Some of the keys are learning HOW to select what you need. One click selects a line, two clicks selects a face, 3 clicks selects the whole piece.

Dave does have a small tutorial available for purchase and I must tell you that it is worth EVERY penny. He goes very nicely through a whole example.

[Dan Friedrichs]

As Ben said, it depends on whether or not the model has the jointery (etc) details included. Sketchup doesn't make "plans" - it makes "models". If you showed us a photograph of a house and asked how to build it, the answer would be, "You can't build a house if all you have is a photo of its outside". Likewise, the Sketchup model you have may be nothing more than a 3D drawing of the outside faces - breaking that into a cutlist is going to be really hard. Easier than a photo, because you can spin the model around and use the measurement tools easily and add/remove "pieces", but there is no magic button to press that says, "Turn this drawing into construction plans".

[Daniel O'Neill]

I use Autocad at work every day and Sketchup makes me want to pull my hair out. Since WW is not for work I avoid using autocad for it and have been in the same boat as you in terms of learning curve. I would at the very least learn to dimension and then get that model and dimension and print from a bunch of different views and that will help you build. The groups & components are a huge key and once I started using them (at Dave's recommendation) they helped a lot.

Daniel

[Brian Lamb]

Throw Sketchup to the wind and use Onshape or Fusion 360, both are powerful 3D CAD systems and are free for the hobby or casual user. I have been using Alibre for over 5 years now (It's called Geomagic now) and it's getting to be "old" but still does 99% of what I need, it was $200 at the time. Onshape is one I have been involved in the beta testing since it came out and it's pretty potent and continuously evolving. I think Fusion 360 is a bit ahead of Onshape because it has not only CAD, but an integrated CAM side that given it's free, is pretty handy for any of us using CNC equipment.

[Guy Dotan]

I've found Jay Bates' SketchUp videos and articles (http://jayscustomcreations.com/sketchup/) extremely helpful when it comes to learning how to use SketchUp for woodworking.



Agreed. His videos are great. I absolutely love SketchUp. It is extremely helpful with measurements, especially if strange angles are involved. Here is my first woodworking project, made from construction cedar lamber, based on things I learned from Jay: https://3dwarehouse.sketchup.com/model.html?id=ude7ecac8-1ef2-413c-8a65-6b27a74745e3

As Chris mentioned, it is critical to understand groups or components. There is a little bit of a learning curve but then it is easy.

[John TenEyck]

SketchUp fan here. To learn it you need to follow someone's tutorial. I bought Tim Killen's e-book through FWW, but Dave Richards has since come out with a DVD that might be as good/better. Trying to figure it out by myself was nothing but heartache; after I got Killen's book it was straightforward and fast. In less than 4 hours I knew enough to be able to do real work with it. I'd never draw by hand anymore, nor with the 2D CAD I used in my corporate life.

There are all kinds of plugins for SketchUp; I just found one that draws your complete cabinet for you after inputting data into the fields. It even renders it in the wood type of your choice. You can draw a kitchen's worth of cabinets in an hour! SketchUp also has a 3D Warehouse where you can find all kinds of components that you can download directly into your model. Think kitchen appliances, handles, TV', toilet or sink, even complete drawings of a piece of furniture.

All for free.

John

[Paul F Franklin]

Joe Zeh has on online course called sketchup for woodworking (or something like that). *Highly* recommend. He is a woodworker and teaches a solid approach for building a sketchup model that will feel natural to any woodworker. And he teaches a simple strategy for components and layers. He has a slide in the handouts titled 6 rules for Sketchup that if followed will eliminate 95% of confusion and stupid errors.

[Jim German]

I also dislike sketchup. I beleve that as its name implies it was designed for doing sketchs, not dimensioned drawings. If you're just using it to get a feel for how something might look, then it works well. However if you want to create dimensioned drawings for actually creating the parts, a real CAD software will work much better. Sketchup uses a completely different methodology than any other CAD software used by a professional engineer. Its quite likely that you will find the methodology used by those CAD programs far easier to understand and use. There are a few free ones out there, Fusion 360 is my favorite.

Keep in mind that there is still a learning curve, it just may be easier to wrap your head around.

[Gerry Grzadzinski]

As a 20+ year daily AutoCAD user, I've also struggled with Sketchup. Mainly, because I didn't want to spend the time to learn something, when I could already do it just as fast in AutoCAD.
Since I can't afford AutoCAD at home, I've been working with Fusion 360 for the last few months. Coming from AutoCAD, it's also a difficult learning curve, because it's different.

For someone with no CAD experience at all, I would think that Fusion 360 has a steeper learning curve. But it's vastly more powerful than Sketchup, which I don't even consider to be a "real" CAD program.

[Bob Lang]

I'm a huge fan of SketchUp. (Full disclosure, I use it professionally, write about it and teach it). It isn't the easiest piece of software to learn, but it is well worth the time and effort it takes. It is quite different from traditional CAD programs and there are common hurdles that most new users struggle with. Part of that is understanding the behavior of the stuff you make on screen, part of it is becoming aware of what you see and what your hand is doing on the mouse buttons, and part of it is rewiring your brain and hand/eye coordination. I've taught hundreds of people (thousands if you count readers of my books) and if you stick with it, the light bulb clicks on with a little bit of practice. From that point on modeling is fast and easy.

The advantages of modeling over other forms of planning/designing/engineering are these: you can pretend you're building the thing; I usually make parts that defined the outside dimensions of something first, then make all the parts that go in between by snapping between those points-I don't need to interrupt the process to calculate sizes and I don't suffer the consequences of mathematical errors. I can see (and show someone else) what the thing will look like from any angle, as I work and when I'm finished. After the model is completed, I can extract any information I want from the model; any form of orthographic or perspective drawing, or a precise list of part sizes on a spreadsheet.

I was trained to draw on a board and used AutoCAD in the woodworking industry for many years. SketchUp is faster and just as precise as any other method, and I routinely catch things while building a model that wouldn't be noticed until I got to the shop with previous methods. If you want to make life easier in the shop, learn to use SketchUp.

Bob Lang

[lowell holmes]

I have SketchUp and two versions of AutoCad. I use SketchUp for 3d modeling.

If I want to make a sketch, because of 25 years experience, I will go to AutoCad. The only reason is I intuitively do things in AutoCad that I have to flounder a bit in Sketchup.

I think SetchUp is well worth the investment (available free) and don't understand why someone would not want to spend the time and learn it. Bob Lang has instruction videos you should get.

I have them, the price is a bargain.

OBTW, for the record, my AutoCad programs are legal. I purchased both of them.

[mike holden]

Back to the original posters problem: He has a sketchup file without components and wants to get measurements and know the various pieces required to build.
Okay, measurements are easy using the tape measure tool.
The various pieces are not so easy, he will have to decide for himself what the various pieces are and redraw them, either in the program or on paper.
Essentially, the sketchup file is useless for his needs as is.
All the discussion of what program he should use, should have used, how the model should have been drawn, etc. do not address the questions he asked.
Mike

[Jim Barstow]

I use sketchup for almost all my projects but still find it annoying. If something doesn't work, e.g., objects don't snap, dimension off by tiny amount, face magically disappears, there is absolutely no way to determine what the problem is short of redrawing sections. There have been many times I've been forced to start over while muttering a long string of obscene poetry.

as to the original question, if the sketch wasn't done with components in mind, i.e., it is a collection of primitives, the best you can do is get dimensions of those primitives using the ruler. I've tried to create components after the fact using surgical selection and it is completely frustrating.

[Gene Davis]

I use the free version and have been doing so since SU was new. Online videos have helped me greatly, but the best thing to do is just spend the hours, days, and weeks necessary to learn. It is nothing at all like any other kind of 3D modeling software.

Taking someone else's model and trying to use it for your woodworking project only will work if the original modeler built with woodworking in mind. If the model is not built that way (groups, components, knowledge of joinery) one will need to rebuild the whole thing.

Key things are grouping every single thing that is a separate piece, and grouping as component anything that repeats in a composition. Like table legs.

Learn to flip parts, to mirror them, to use the scale tool to resize. Learn to use layers, and how to rearrange parts on layers. Learn to hide parts and unhide them. One of the greatest features is how you can access surfaces and edges for editing when using the xray mode.

I have used Sketchup to build houses, staircases, fixtures and jigs, figure out tile patterns, and of course furniture.

I would be lost without Sketchup.

[John Leech]

Thanks for all the help and advice. I wandered away from SMC and woodworking in general as life took hold and my daughter continues to grow faster than comfortable. It's nice to know that there are places like SMC that I can return to almost as if I never left. From what I can gather, I need to spend quite some time watching videos and using other online resources to sort out the aspects of SketchUp. I will likely start with Jay Bates' resources and move on from there if I decide if it's worth pursuing further

As for the trebuchet, I think my daughter and I will build it the old fashioned way.

Thanks again,
John

[Rick Whitehead]

Before you give up on the Sketchup model, there is an easier way to see all the pieces and dimension them.
There is a "Components" menu that has every component in the model as a individual object. Click on whichever component you want to use, and place it the drawing by moving it with the cursor wherever you want it. You can use the "Standard Views" menu under the "Camera" on the top toolbar to get whatever view you want( top, side, end). To get the dimensions, use the "Dimension" tool, the one that looks like a "3" with dimension lines attached. The tool that looks like a tape measure is for guide lines. Click on one end of the object, move the cursor, and click on the other end of the object to dimension it. When you have all the dimensions drawn, you can use the "Scenes" function to save that view so you can click on that scene and retrieve it.
Like most operations in woodworking, it would be easier for me to to show it to you than to describe it, but I've doen my best. If you have any questions, you can PM me.
I use both Sketchup and AutoCAD. Like others, I find Sketchup easier for 3D drawings and AutoCAD for 2d. However, I have to convert Sketchup drawings to DXF in order to use the toolpath software for our CNC router.
Good luck with your trebuchet project! I hope it is scuuessful no matter how you get there!
Rick

[Keith Weber]

Sketch Up is a great program. The problem is that people expect it to do things that it does not do well. If you need cut lists to make things, I'm sure there's better programs out there. I use it for most things I build, because it excels at two very important things for me.

Firstly, when you design something in SU, you can get a feel for its proportions by rotating the 3D model and looking at it from many angles. If something looks a little odd, you just make an adjustment (say extend the overhang of the table top) and then take another look at it from many angles. You can even build the environment that it sits in to see how the piece is proportioned to fit its environment. This ability alone is worth every minute of the time it takes me to construct a model. Ever since I've started using SU, I've not once built something and then wished it was a little wider, taller, thinner, more angled, etc... Of course, it takes an amount of creativity and artistry to be able to look at a model and realize what needs to be changed. SU can't do this on its own, so you have to use your brain to make the program do what you need it to do. It's very good at making the designing task easier.

The second thing that I find invaluable, is its ability to generate dimensions in 3 dimensions. When I built my long, narrow shop, I had models of my tools and could move everything around and very quickly determine how much clearance I had for walking, whether I had room for the throw of a particular machine, or the clearance of a door. It's so much easier than trying to account for everything using trig and a calculator. You get accuracy, mistake mitigation, and a nice visual picture of what you are doing.

I, personally, don't use cut lists. I've never felt the need for them. Having a 3D model that I can measure dimensions is enough for me to build whatever I build. If you can't build something without a cut list, then there are probably better programs to help you with that than SU.