On Feb 28, 3:12 pm, Larry wrote:
wrote
ups.com:



On Feb 28, 10:24 am, Larry wrote:

I've posted this before but the best tutorial I've found
is athttp://www.srww.com/blog. You'll need to hunt for it
a bit but it's called "Drawing a bedside table". It's an 8
part tutorial that you can download in Word format or
follow it online. It covers a lot of the problems
discussed here including making components, using layers,
dimensioning, etc.

As I said elsewhere, the model exists to allow me to make
the piece. Putting more effort into the model than what is
needed to do that is a waste of time. Why do I need a
model of the drawer? All I need to make a drawer is
length, width, height, thickness of parts. That's it.
What is the point of modeling it beyond that? What do I
need the tenons and mortises modeled for in the first
place, and what benefit does showing them at each leg
accomplish? Why do I need to model the dovetail recess in
the front legs if I am going to be cutting the dovetails on
the rail and using that to mark the location of the recess?
This isn't mass production where one needs drawings such
that I could give the drawing of an individual part to
someone who has no other knowledge of the rest of the piece
and have them produce the correct part.

-Kevin

For some of us that aren't as gifted as yourself, it helps us
think the plans through from start to finish. I haven't
reached the stage where I can build from pictures in my head.
I like to see what I'm building *before* I start. Helps me
avoid mistakes, and I'm full of them. Not sure who to credit
it to but can you say "precision cut firewood"? Yep, I've got
some of that...

Precisely because we do make mistakes do I prefer to work as much as
possible with what is in front of me, already made. What happens when
we screw something up, but it's still quite workable as long as we
adjust as we go along, but then we forget what changed and go back to
working from our drawing and create parts that perfectly match the
drawing but don't work with what we already screwed up? I mean who
hasn't made a beautiful mortise, perfect in every respect, except for
being in the wrong place.

I can't visualize a complete project in my head, if I could I wouldn't
need sketchup at all. But once I get the outside of it squared away
then I can just sort of chip away at everything I don't know until I
have enough to get started. That may mean drawing out certain areas
that I don't understand. I can always go back to the drawing and add
more, but if I took the approach of having to model every last detail
before I got to go in the shop, that would just suck all the fun out
of it.

-Kevin