By Gary Mann
This is the second blog in this series that looks at room definition and how to manage our time more effectively when setting up a model. I have omitted the initial stages in order to concentrate on the most pertinent issues.
When defining a room, you are asked to “Click near middle of wall or inside Floor / Ceiling selector”, because the program needs to know which of the 6 surfaces you wish to define. See below:
We are all creatures of habit and the tendency is to click on all 6 faces (minimum for a rectangular room), but if you understand the programming you can reduce the tasks by at least 67% by avoiding using the Floor / Ceiling selector.
The reason for this is simple and works like this. Cymap is aware of the DXF floorplans input by the user and a simple 3 storey model should be sufficient to explain most cases.
If the model has only 1 Floor Cymap will default both horizontal surfaces as External Roof & Floor.
If the model has 2 storeys then the ground level rooms will have Ambient Floor and Internal Ceiling exposures and the uppermost level will have Internal floor and Exposed roof exposures.
If the model has 3 storeys the Ground level floor will have Ambient Exposure for the Floor and the uppermost level will have an exposed roof. All other intermediate levels will have Internal ceiling and Internal floors set as Temperature Difference exposure.
So, the moral of this blog is “leave well alone” unless you have an atrium which transcends several levels as this will always inherit the properties on the floor in which it is input.