Draw Fences and Rails

 

Draw fences and guard rails in your projects.

 

Contents

 

Draw Fence or Guard Rail

Select

Drawing Level

Delete

Adjusting Handles

Hide

Lock

Change Fence Type

Change Size

Paint and Materials
Rails Between Columns and Posts


Draw Fence or Guard Rail

The basic process is to choose a fence or rail type from the menu (right) and click-and-drag from one anchor point to another.

 

See examples of Picket, Privacy, Ranch and Wrought Iron fences below and in the Directory.

 

You determine the length of each segment when you click-and-drag. Most fences come in 4 or 8 foot sections but custom fences can have arbitrary lengths.

 

Adding Sections to a Fence: You have to be in Draw Fence mode to add sections to a fence by clicking on the anchor point of an existing fence and dragging as shown.

 

Example

 


Select

Select a fence by double-clicking it.


Drawing Level

Fences are drawn on the current grid level or on top of the object you click-and-drag on - whichever is higher. See Edit> Move Work Grid for more information about changing levels.


Delete

Select the fence or guardrail and press the Delete or Backspace keys.  You may also right-click it and choose Delete from the pop-up menu.

 

Note: When deleting a fence or guardrail, all connected sections will be deleted.


Adjusting Handles

Select a fence or guardrail and drag the handles to adjust the size, length or position. See the example below.

 


Hide

Right-click and choose "Hide."  Hide All Fences and Rails by choosing View> Hide> Fences and Posts. Show hidden Fences and Rails by choosing Show All from the View menu.


Lock

To lock or unlock a fence so you can't accidentally change it, right-click and choose "Lock."


Change Fence Type

You can change the look, size or style of the fence or rail by dragging in a different one from the directory and dropping it on the existing one. There must be a fence or rail in the drawing for this to work. Dragging in fence and rail styles onto nothing makes nothing.

 

For example:

 

 

Experiment with Different Fence Types: In this example we start by drawing a wrought iron fence and convert it to picket, privacy and other fence types by dragging them in from the Directory.

 


Change Size

In the directory there are optional sizes for most of the fences and rails. Click the link under the thumbnail and drag the bigger or smaller sizes onto the fence or post. Example:

 


Paint and Materials

Apply paint and materials on fences and guard rails by dragging them in from the directory. See Paint and Colors and Materials and Textures for more information.


Rails between Columns and Posts

Build> Draw Posts and Columns allows you to put fences and rails between posts or columns on porches and elsewhere. To do this, just drag the fence or rail style onto the post or column as shown below:

 

Note: To hide the fence or rail, right-click the column or post and choose "Hide Rails."