Diagram Perdition

[George Hatch]

To all,

I just got done spending 3 hours on a diagram. Old apartment property with 15 buildings, 11 different floorplans plus 3 different garages and a market. It also took me 2 hours to measure it. My eyes hurt from staring at this damn screen and trying to sqeeze all these structures onto a letter sized page (this will be a narrative report). What a hassle. This reminds me of the old days when we would do pen and ink on graph paper with manual calculations. I don't miss those days at all.


What's the worst diagram you ever had to draw?


George Hatch

 

[Eminent Domain]

A 44 sided 2800+/- SF lake home with lots of octagons as well as the old 1950's industrial plants (of course whose plans and specs sheets no longer exist). Some of these have 75 - 100 :x sides when you account for docks, loading areas, additions, etc.....


BF

 

[Pamela Crowley (Florida)]

It was about 3,500 SF GLA. The plan was too wide for the site so they made odd ball angles to make it fit - NONE were 45 degrees. The second floor had a cat-walk with dormer windows in the center with bedrooms on each end - with dormer windows. I had to go back a second time to attempt to figure out the angles.

It was also the first time I'd ever used WinSketch. I started that one over and over again - about 50 times.

There have been a couple of others since then that were real odd balls and took not only a very long time to measure but drawing them was a real study in frustration. Large octogon shower stall jutting out into the courtyard pool area that was in the center of the house - another one with various balconies off from each separate bedroom suite on the second level - all at different angles. There are some very large and unique custom mansions on the water here.

It would be interesting if we could post some of our real strange and difficult sketches here.

 

[Caterina Platt]

George,

I am never afraid to add a page or two if one page doesn't allow for the size of the building in a scale that I feel 'best serves the eye of the reader'. 1"=60' or smaller does not allow you to show much detail (I'm one of those die hard wierdos who insists on placing the interior walls unless it's a time crunch assignment) and good luck reading those dimensions. I place a disclosure on the sketch that the drawing is for the reader's understanding of the building improvements and their dimensions, and does not reflect the actual placement of the structures on their site. (of course, that's what the ILR is for!)

 

[wyecoyote]

Worst for me was a 2 story house with 2 basement levels (9,000 SF+/-). The house had all weird angles and not one floor that stood on top of the other. House was built by a musician with full recording studio in one of the basement levels and half a basketball court in the basement. The grade was about 30%. Took half a day to sketch. Owner was getting really nervous because Pearl Jam was on there way over and he wanted me out by then.

 

[Caterina Platt]

Geez,

After putting you through that measuring exercise, the least he could have done is let you meet the band! :lol:

 

[Thomas N. Morgan]

To All,

I've had my troubles with those odd angles, too. What have you found is the best method of measuring the angles correctly? I have used what I think is called a mitre square. It can put up against the intersecting walls, made to conform to the angle, then locked so it won't move, laid on a spare space on your folder and drawn there, and copied later to your actual diagram.

I'm looking for a better way.

Thomas N. Morgan
Ocala, FL

 

[msking]

I never cared much for small, single-story, rectangular ranch houses until I became an appraiser - now I LOVE 'em. And if they have identical neighbors for several blocks, all the better!

 

[wyecoyote]

There is a angle measurer device I don't know that actual name of it. Like the meiter measurer you place it against the walls. Once there it tells you the angle of the wall.

 

[Richard Carlsen]

Mine was a house that was started about 27 years ago (and not yet finished) by a 60's hippie-turned-residential builder with no real corners and sort of a tiered semi-circle design (work in progress) on a beautiful 6-acre site but the house was on the steepest part of the land with a 35% slope. It had 3 floors, none of which seemed to be on top of the other and a big 2 story high general purpose/workshop room attached to the house. The attached garage which was on another level and the current project was moving the main bedroom to the basement level with open bedroom and open bath/shower facilities. In the one kids bedroom upstairs, when you closed the door there was a full oil painting of a tiger jumping at you. I think the 60's hippie-girlfriend/wife (?) painted that. Nice people and fun to do the field notes. We laughed a lot about it because he knew what he had.

I will have to say that all of the work was very well done and though the decoration was not to my taste, the decor was done well and with continuity.

You should have seen the functional depreciation. The LO knew the house and what I was getting into. We had a good laugh over it.