[LDCad] Help with Donor files

[Nils GrüLe]

Hi,
my name is Nils ans I started building with LDCad some days ago.

The software is really cool and nice to use but I have trouble with adding additional parts.

I want to build a steam locomotive with wheels from Big Ben Bricks.

As some of you know, BBB is offering .dat files for each wheel design to use them in LDraw.

It is no problem to load the models in LDCad and have a look at them, but I have trouble to insert them in the Part bin.

I read trough Roland Melkerts webpage but it seems like I can´t find the procedure.
The nearest was this one: http://www.melkert.net/LDCad/tech/templates

I copied the files from BBB into the "c:/users/puplic/public documents/ldraw/unoffical/parts" folder and added this path in the parts find configuration in LDCad.

I tried it over and over but the wheels won´t show up in the Part bin 

Where would they normally show up ? Do i have to tell LDCad "somehow" else about the parts ?

Thank you for your help.

Best regards

Nils

[Philippe Hurbain]

Hi Nils, welcome here!
I think the documentation section you should read is http://www.melkert.net/LDCad/tech/partBin (and take a look at files part bin folder, they are plain text files).
Otherwise you could simply use the search tool (part bin top -> minifig with magnifier) and look for BBB...

Also note that BBB wheels have been tweaked to improve LDraw compatibility and are available on Parts Tracker: https://www.ldraw.org/cgi-bin/ptscan.cgi...ope=header

[Roland Melkert]

It is no problem to load the models in LDCad and have a look at them, but I have trouble to insert them in the Part bin.

If the part has a category meta indicating it's a train part or if it the description starts with 'train' it should show up in the by category/train group.

Although that group is a bit hard to find and it contains a lot of parts.

It would probably be better if I added a dedicated train section to the sorted tree branch.

But you don't have to wait for that if you're comfortable with configuration files as Philo pointed out.

[Nils GrüLe]

Thank you both for your quick answers.
Now it works 
Looks like I set up everything right but used the wrong searchterm ( the name of the file itself ).

Now after searching for "train" and browsing through the results, I found the wheels.

@Roland: I really love your LDCad. It is really nice, that you share it with all the brick loving people.

[Nils GrüLe]

Good morning.
Seems like my shout of success was a bit too early.

I managed to get the files downloaded from the BBB site loaded in LDCad.
That worked so fare but they are not very nice to work with. Not centered, etc.

After that, I tried the files from Part Tracker, downloaded the models and submodels and added them the same way.

LDCad loads them in the Part bin but not the whole thing.

Seems like the submodels are not loaded and correctly placed.

How do I manage to tell LDCad to load the whole thing ? 

I tried placing the submodels in the "s" folder but that didn´t worked.

Sorry for my Newbie questions   And have a nice day.

[Philippe Hurbain]

I tried placing the submodels in the "s" folder but that didn´t worked.

That's the thing to do (note that the s forder must be a subfolder of parts folder). Have you restarted LDCad after putting subparts in s folder? LDCad caches parts at startup.

[Nils GrüLe]

Thank you Philippe,

good to see, that I was not totally wrong 

I placed everything in the right folders but it seems like a submodel is missing.

I double checked, that I got all the mentioned submodels but it still looks like in the attached picture.

Do I have to search the failure at my side or is something wrong with the model ?

[Philippe Hurbain]

Thank you Philippe,

good to see, that I was not totally wrong 

I placed everything in the right folders but it seems like a submodel is missing.

I double checked, that I got all the mentioned submodels but it still looks like in the attached picture.

Do I have to search the failure at my side or is something wrong with the model ?

Looks like you're missing 48\7-8ring2.dat primitive (which is indeed listed in this train wheel dependencies). This high res primitive should go into ldraw\p\48 folder.
But instead of hunt and peck all missing files, it would be easier to download and install ALL unofficial files at once, you can get them from https://www.ldraw.org/library/tracker/

[Ulrich Röder]

Hi Nils,

...welcome here !

As a LGauge Enthusiast I reworked all the BBB Train Wheels to LDraw conformity -  but not official yet.

There were several reasons  to do so - file bigness and a lot of mistakes like overlapping ...missiing polygons and also resolution.

You can find them here:

https://www.ldraw.org/cgi-bin/ptscan.cgi...ope=header
[/url]

looks like so:

   

   


Have Fun

Uli



[url=https://www.ldraw.org/cgi-bin/ptscan.cgi?q=bbb&scope=header]

[Nils GrüLe]

Looks like you're missing 48\7-8ring2.dat primitive (which is indeed listed in this train wheel dependencies). This high res primitive should go into ldraw\p\48 folder.
But instead of hunt and peck all missing files, it would be easier to download and install ALL unofficial files at once, you can get them from https://www.ldraw.org/library/tracker/

Hi Philippe, thanks for the hint with the unofficial files, I think I will go that way. The mentioned file 48\7-8ring... was not missing   I made sure it is placed in the p\48 folder but still the same problem.

Hi Nils,

...welcome here !

As a LGauge Enthusiast I reworked all the BBB Train Wheels to LDraw conformity -  but not official yet.

There were several reasons  to do so - file bigness and a lot of mistakes like overlapping ...missiing polygons and also resolution.

You can find them here:

https://www.ldraw.org/cgi-bin/ptscan.cgi...ope=header
[/url]

looks like so:






Have Fun

Uli



[url=https://www.ldraw.org/cgi-bin/ptscan.cgi?q=bbb&scope=header]

Thank you Uli Great work you did there ! ( Trains and wheels ).

I ordered The XL wheels from BBB last week. I am curious what they will look like in reality.
My first attempt in this category will be a BR 86 as I think the XL wheels are just the right size for this locomotive and I like it.

[Ulrich Röder]

Thanks Nils,

...if you initially imported the parts individually by hand, you may have made a mistake.

Check times with the search bar function in the Ldraw main folder "7-8ring2.dat".

Exactly 2 of them should appear with the same name.

If there are 3, you probably still have a standard resolution variant in the "48" folder.

With "Open file path" you can check this in detail, you can also use LDDP or LDPE to check the files in the respective header to see whether the CORRECT variant is actually saved in the "48" folder.

In terms of their designation, they cannot be distinguished because they are absolutely identical - only the path is different.