Walls

General information on architectural elements

You can use the Wall tool to draw different types of walls:

• Straight walls
  The approach is the same as with the Line tool in 2D design.
• Rectangular walls
  You can create four straight walls in a single operation - this works just like the Rectangle tool in 2D design.
• Curved walls
  A polyline is used to approximate the circle: This results in short, straight wall sections that can be addressed as a single entity.
• Circular walls
  Use this to draw walls as you would a Circle in 2D design. You can enter full circles and arcs. A polyline is used to approximate the circle.
• / Polygonal walls
  As with curved walls, you can use this to draw walls with any number of corners, delimited by an arc. A distinction is made between walls that are ”inscribed in" and ”circumscribed about" an imaginary circle.
  Inscribed means that the first segment and last segment have half the length of a segment. The division is at a tangent to the circle you enter when defining the geometric outline.
  Circumscribed means that the first segment and last segment have the length of a normal section. The division is on a secant with the circle you enter when you define the geometric outline.
• Entity-based walls
  This draws walls based on 2D entities (for example, lines, polylines, splines) or composite elements. The wall is drawn along the donor element, which has no effect on the donor element itself.
• Spline-based walls
  Use this to draw walls as you would a Spline in 2D design.

Clicking Properties displays a dialog box in which you can define the walls more precisely. Enter values for the height of the wall, its thickness and elevation. You can also define additional properties such as the building trade, material, priority rating, element interaction, format properties (pen, line, color) and surface properties (hatching style, pattern or fill).

Previews keep you informed about the wall structure, showing how the wall looks in the standard views and in the Wireframe, Hidden and Animation view types.

Note: To save time, define the materials and other attributes when you enter the walls. Allplan uses the information you define here for subsequent analyses and reports based on the building model. Of course, you can also assign materials and attributes at a later time. Materials can be transferred directly from applications used for tendering, awarding and invoicing.

Walls are generally drawn like the base 2D entities. For example, you draw a straight wall just as you would a straight line – all the construction aids available when you draw a line are also available when drawing a wall.

The only other thing you need to do is define the wall’s offset direction and enter Properties for the wall in the dialog box. The standard approach is to define the height of the wall based on reference planes: Define the height of the default planes once. All the walls associated with these planes are automatically correct.

Other wall types

The wall types listed are complemented by walls of a freeform outline or cross-section (profile walls). Moreover, various automation tools are available. You can use these tools to generate walls with one or more construction layers on the basis of lines (sketches, for example), parallel lines (for example, 2D outlines) or based on rooms that you have already defined by using 2D floor plans or scans of drawings. Thus, you can quickly convert a 2D design to a complex 3D building model.