I was thinking about adding the scissor truss family to my SketchUp plugin until I realized that the calculation of the scarf of the bottom chord was a bit more complicated than your typical common truss with a zero pitch bottom chord.  When I actually sat down and did the  math it became clear how much more complicated it actually was.  If anyone cares to check the math I would be very grateful.  I will probably run it into AutoCAD tomorrow and graphically check the geometry against the equation, they should give the same result.



Notice how the bearing width factors into the scarf and ultimately affects the entire design of the truss (web placement, panel lengths). This is why the truss companies require the bearing width before they can quote you on scissor truss package.

Makes one appreciate computers a little more when you realize that the software, once programmed, can take care of all these detailed calculations without us giving it a second thought.

With the truss plugin I have been primarily focused on typical MPC wood trusses however the potential for other truss types does exist.  I'm wondering if some of the more exotic timber truss types can be codified in a similar way so that one can generate possible configurations and experiment with their design.

One interesting truss type that comes to mind is the Hammer Beam truss/frame as shown below:



Some other variants (and probably quite a few more):



Any thoughts on these types of trusses?  Would there be any interest or need?  Would it be appropriate to add these types of frames/trusses into this plugin or would a separate plugin be a better option?

To get the latest version login to the Account Manager here:

https://design.medeek.com/login/

Click on the plugin link.

Your order number and data will appear, click on the order number, then click on the Download Now button, this will be the latest version.

All licenses currently purchased are permanent, this means you are entitled to all upgrades in the future.  At some point I may move to a yearly license so that those licenses will only entitle the user 1 year of upgrades and then after that they will be required to purchase an upgrade to get the latest version.  I don't want to make the licensing a burden to the users but I also want to be fair to myself if I spend alot of time and effort adding in more trusses and features. 

You will notice that the License type in the Account Manager lists the License as permanent.  This license and order is associated with your Client ID in the database.  As long as you have access to your Client ID and can login you have access to the latest plugin.

For the common truss types I've configured the plugin to detect the SketchUp template units and display a metric UI.  I've also replaced the x/12 system with degrees for the metric interface.  All member sizes and other dimensions are open for the metric interface as well.

Go ahead and give it a whirl, if it checks out then I will go ahead and update the attic and monopitch UI with the metric option.

I'm looking at adding in scissor trusses.  Below is a matrix of common scissor truss configurations.  Once they get much larger than a 6/6 I think they probably go to site assembled half trusses, I'm not entirely sure since I don't have any drawings or diagrams of anything larger than a 6/6.

I've added a toolbar/icon which admittedly is more convenient than having to open up the extensions menu item.

I'm not entirely sure I'm happy with the icon set I've created but it is really hard to make much of a 24x24 or 16x16 square.

Currently I am dumping the trusses at the origin (0,0,0) since that seemed like the most natural thing to do but I can see where a more intuitive placement system makes more sense and would eliminate the additional steps needed to move the array of trusses into place and possibly rotating them. 

I like the idea of selecting a rectangle which auto-sizes and orients the trusses. 

Adding a quick launch icon should not be too much trouble either.

Monopitch trusses are also now live:



Currently the 2/2 and 3/3 configurations are available, more of this truss family will be added after I address the metric issue and a few of the other requested items.

Howe truss type is now active. 

The latest plugin version is 1.0.4.  I would highly recommend downloading the latest version since I have also spent some time this morning cleaning up my code and removing global methods and variables so that I don't clash with other extensions or modules. 

I don't think a metric version would be too hard to create.  It would be cool if I could somehow have a configuration file of sorts so that imperial or metric could be semi-permanent setting that can be switched within SketchUp.  Not really sure how to do this within the API but I will add that to the todo list. 

I'm assuming the units of interest would be millimeters, correct me if I'm wrong.  I think I will also open up the pitch variable so any pitch can be chosen instead of limiting it.  I would also like have it in the settings where someone can manage the default values and choose between degrees or x/12 for the pitch.

I'm not really familiar with the metric lumber sizes.  Would you want the variable completely open or limited to certain metric standard sizes?

Trusses are now created as components with each individual member of the truss a group. Arrays of trusses are multiple instances of the same component.

I think this plugin may actually have some potential now.

A couple more screenshots for fun.  A well designed truss is a beautiful thing to behold:





I really appreciate everyone's feedback, this has helped guide me in the right direction on all of this and improved my understanding of SketchUp immensely.

22' truss, notice the change in the web configurations as compared to the 24' truss. 



There still may be a few kinks to work out in the algorithm that determines how many webs to place but overall I'm pretty pleased with what I have so far. 

I've officially added the attic truss updates to the plugin so they are now live.

This is the same truss I used in my 28'x48' garage:



Now I need to work on the energy heel option for this truss type.

I'm testing the attic truss.  At the moment I've only got one configuration which is probably about right for an attic truss that spans about 24-28 feet.  You can see below that pushing it out to span 36 feet is a bit of a stretch:



The piggyback option is enabled by enforcing a max. height in the inputs.

The left and right overhangs can now be set independently, however the right overhang defaults to match the left overhang to help speed user input:



I've also created a new page for the plugin with some basic documentation:

http://design.medeek.com/resources/medeektrussplugin.html

Just an FYI, the energy heels are enabled fully for the fink truss but not for any other truss type and the TRIAL version is actually not limited in any way.  I will probably keep it that way until the plugin is significant enough to actually warrant charging for it.