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I had exactly this problem and am pleased to say that your work arround worked for me!!

I was a user of Punch software and moved to 3D Architect because it was easier to use than Punch. I am pleased to say that Visual Building is even easier to use than 3D Architect.

Elitems is correct in that there is a bug within the dormer function that can sometimes cause problems in the 3D view. Obviously this bug is only apparent in certain circumstances and only if you are installing dormers.

Using the example project as distributed (example4) as quoted by Elitems.

In the 3D view there is a bad roof surface between the two dormers.



This can be easily rectified by changing the pitch on one or both of the dormer roofs. In this example case I changed the pitch from 30 deg. to 30.01 deg, which was sufficient enough to avoid the bug.



If you do find similar problems in your 3D views with dormers try modifying the pitch by very small ammounts.

This is only a work arround until the bug is fixed.

Visual Building is not a direct descendent of Arcon, the core of which was developed in Delphi 2. Visual Building is a true .Net product and developed in C#, by the ex Arcon development team, and yes Visual Building's user interface (UI) is far superior.

I have been using Visual Building Basic (v3.0.2.1) to help plan a loft conversion that comprises 2 hipped dormers (& 2 roof windows) being added to a hipped roof.

Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, the dormer functionality is broken - once dormers are placed, they dont render correctly (i.e. dormer walls either disappear or end up 10M tall or the dormer soffits arent complete) and if you have 2 dormers on the same roof, the software creates a roof that spans both of the dormers. This particular bug can be seen without you even having to design your own building, just select any of the sample projects (from the Project Wizard) that have dormer roofs.

Has anyone else noticed this and can someone from the company confirm if the development team are aware of these problems?

I have reverted back to using Arcon 3D Architect which can handle dormers correctly but it a horrible UI compared to Visual Building (which I know is based on the Arcon product but was rewritten). However, it doesnt matter how much more user friendly an application is, if it's core functionality is broken!