Popular Post sean335 Posted May 23, 2015 Popular Post Report Share Posted May 23, 2015 I broke my thumb a few weeks ago so in lieu of time in the shop I’ve been playing around a lot in SketchUp. Drawing dovetails is an annoyingly tedious task and I wasn’t too happy with the other free plugins I could find, so I tried my hand at writing one. I created a small page with a download link on my site here: <http://seanregan.com/sketchup/dovetail> I wanted to make it super easy to use, so hopefully no instruction is easy. But basically just draw your model like you normally would and build your corners with basic butt joints and then use this plugin to dovetail it. It hasn’t really been tested on anything other than my own models on my laptop, so I’d love some outside feedback. I’ll also admit that it’s not perfect. It has a tendency to get confused on complex shapes and can sometimes make a mess of your model, but undo is always an option. I know drawing joinery in SketchUp is of questionable utility, but it sure looks nice. I hope someone else finds this useful. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee Bussy Posted May 27, 2015 Report Share Posted May 27, 2015 Worked great for me, thanks for sharing! I'll no doubt break it sooner or later so if/when I do I'll share what I was doing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sean335 Posted May 29, 2015 Author Report Share Posted May 29, 2015 Awesome, thanks for sharing! Great to hear it's working for other people Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wtnhighlander Posted May 29, 2015 Report Share Posted May 29, 2015 It certainly looks awesome in the rendering! I don't use sketchup much, as it is a real hassle to use on Linux, but I'd really like to get back into it sometime. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee Bussy Posted May 29, 2015 Report Share Posted May 29, 2015 Now if you could make cutting dovetails as easy. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Milo Posted June 4, 2015 Report Share Posted June 4, 2015 Cool! I'm making the laptop desk in the latest FW, and was doing a sketchup first for the cutlist. This will be a great addition. Thanks for sharing! Milo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
h3nry Posted June 5, 2015 Report Share Posted June 5, 2015 Thaks, that's great! On a slightly related note - do you know a good resource for learning how to program a sketchup plug-in? I've often thought about it, but don't really know where to start. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee Bussy Posted June 5, 2015 Report Share Posted June 5, 2015 Thaks, that's great! On a slightly related note - do you know a good resource for learning how to program a sketchup plug-in? I've often thought about it, but don't really know where to start. Depends on what direction you are coming from. Here's a basic basic start: http://www.sketchup.com/intl/en/developer/docs/new_to_ruby Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
h3nry Posted June 5, 2015 Report Share Posted June 5, 2015 Depends on what direction you are coming from. Here's a basic basic start: http://www.sketchup.com/intl/en/developer/docs/new_to_ruby Thanks - I got the "HelloWorld" plugin working, so it'll probably put me on the right track. hopefully by the time I need to plan another project in sketchup I'll be ready to make some of the tools I wish it had. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee Bussy Posted June 5, 2015 Report Share Posted June 5, 2015 I have resisted looking at writing plugins. When I do something like that I spend all my time developing and nothing for what I was intending to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sean335 Posted June 5, 2015 Author Report Share Posted June 5, 2015 Thaks, that's great! On a slightly related note - do you know a good resource for learning how to program a sketchup plug-in? I've often thought about it, but don't really know where to start. The source code for almost all plugins is open to anyone to see. I just learned by taking a look at the source for CutList and then kind of followed their same strategy. Sketchup has pretty good API documentation here: http://www.sketchup.com/intl/en/developer/. I will say that thinking in 3 dimensions gave me quite a few headaches, and a great refresher in linear algebra. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
popec Posted August 27, 2015 Report Share Posted August 27, 2015 Now that's just awesome! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MattIsBuffalo Posted September 11, 2015 Report Share Posted September 11, 2015 Now if you could make cutting dovetails as easy.Isn't that just a CNC?*runs for the bunker* The source code for almost all plugins is open to anyone to see. I just learned by taking a look at the source for CutList and then kind of followed their same strategy. Sketchup has pretty good API documentation here: http://www.sketchup.com/intl/en/developer/. I will say that thinking in 3 dimensions gave me quite a few headaches, and a great refresher in linear algebra.Thanks a lot, now I'm going to have another hobby that involves programming outside of my web development job... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LarsCW Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 I find it the easiest in Sketchup to make the dovetail on a workspace which is another group, this is to prevent the newly drawn dovetail from sticking on the workspace. You then copy and paste the dovetail on the parts. When you select the group and activate the move tool you can copy the active group by holding ctrl while moving the group with your mouse. CTRL + V works too. Every part in your drawing should be a group or a component. You need to either be in the editing mode for the part or in outliner pull the dovetail into the group or component. After that you explode the dovetail into the group or component. If you use a component this will change all copies of this component. For this reason I generally use groups only. After you explode the dovetail you need to draw a line in the group so the dovetail will merge into the part. You can use this same method for the internal dovetail, you explode the dovetail, draw a line over the exploded part, this should be a blue line, and then you can delete the piece to make the internal dovetail visible. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MisterDrow Posted July 21, 2016 Report Share Posted July 21, 2016 On 5/29/2015 at 4:48 AM, wtnhighlander said: It certainly looks awesome in the rendering! I don't use sketchup much, as it is a real hassle to use on Linux, but I'd really like to get back into it sometime. I primarily use Mac but have a couple linux boxes as well. What do you use for projects? Or maybe you don't use the computer for that and just draw it out on paper? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wtnhighlander Posted July 22, 2016 Report Share Posted July 22, 2016 I primarily use Mac but have a couple linux boxes as well. What do you use for projects? Or maybe you don't use the computer for that and just draw it out on paper? If the project has complex joinery that I haven't tried before, I'll build it in Sketchup. I run a Windowz VM on my linux machine, since I haven't successfully run Sketchup in WINE since version 8. I do a lot more sketches with a pencil and engineer's graph paper, though. And that just gives me general dimensions. Once the major components are sized (like the carcase of a cabinet), the remaining parts are cht by relative dimensioning. I never use a cut list for dimensions. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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