Using All these Settings inside Punch!

Of course, all the manual settings discussed below are done for you with the automatic adjustments made by HighRise (see ), except for the Ceiling Height adjustment and the berm creation for version 8.0 and higher.

Unfortunately, the PowerTool interface to Punch! does not allow HighRise to set the Ceiling Height values. This must be done by the user manually, the first time and all other times that levels are swapped. All the rest of the measurements pertain to walls and floors that will be created during the drawing of the house. The default values supplied may be correct for these objects, but usually will not be. To make them perfect, the values need to be applied.

(Note: The following directions were compiled for the AS18 program. The properties for AS3000 and above have changed. Instead of properties dialogs there is a consolidated properties bar, shared with the object, texture and other menus. In particular, all the walls in a wall set can have their heights changed in a single action - a great idea!)

The following procedure can be applied to do the settings. Most of them (other than the Ceiling Heights) can be applied as the objects are drawn. The following procedure describes the effort as if HighRise was used after the drawing was complete, so that some settings may be done for a group at once.

• First of all, immediately after HighRise is done, enter the values for the Ceiling Heights for all three floors with the menu selections Design->Ceiling Heights->First Floor, ->Second Floor and ->Third Floor. If you have reminders turned on, then you only need to set those floors that have a reminder placed. Even if this is not the first time HighRise has been executed on a given project, it is a good idea to call these up again after they are all entered, to make sure the right values were entered, as they are basic to getting the default working elevations correctly set. All three have to be done, because they interact to determine the working elevations.
• If the Punch! version is 8.0 or above, then the berm must be created for the basement realization manually. See this page for directions on how to do this.
• On each floor:
  
  • Set the autoFloor option on or off by right-clicking on a member of the exterior wall set and Exterior Wall Properties->Automatic Flooring. If turned on, also set the thickness from the table value. If turned off, change the thickness value back to 0.5".
  • Select all the walls in the exterior wall set and right-click on the elevation slider on the left side of the plan window, select Set Elevation... and set the exterior wall elevations as given. These may also be set individually if desired. Note that they may be different, one from another, but the autofloor's elevation will be determined by the first wall in the set that was drawn. Using the Set Elevation selection which appears on the wall's context (right-click) menu is also possible; beware, that it may show an incorrect value for the current elevation when opened (a bug in AS18), but an entered value will be acted on correctly anyway.
  • Right click on each member of the exterior wall set and select Wall Segment Properties, and enter the base height from the table. This cannot be done for the group as a whole in AS18, unfortunately. It has to be done individually.
  • For interior walls, lower each such wall 1/2" in elevation, and make sure the wall height is the same as the desired ceiling height ("Design Ceiling Height" in the table). Note that interior walls will always be .5" too high because of the 1/2" glitch (see "Differences Between AS18 and AS3000") when they are set to the working elevation on a floor where that is properly set.
  • If one or more manual floors have been drawn for this floorplan, right-click on an edge of each, select Floor Properties->Thickness to set the given thickness, OK, and then right-click on the elevation slider to set the floor's elevation. Note that manual floors should be drawn in such a way that their edges are inside the supporting walls. They should not show externally.
• Set the elevation on an additional manual floor on the top used floorplan to serve as a ceiling for that floor. Set its elevation from the table.
• When a roof is created, set the roof pitch and elevation from the table. The pitch can have decimal places, so angle conversions should work just fine even if Punch! only understands the pitch measurement. Size the roof so that the indicated soffit width is created. Remember to use the exterior size of the building being roofed rather than the center or interior measurement.

Note that the vertical plan places the top floor ceiling piece within the walls, so they are covering and uniform all the way to the place where the walls meet the roof. The additional wall height to do this is figured into the table.

HighRise and the contents of this help file are
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