Lego Digital Designer

JamesJT

I need a small technic turnrable (28T) but that part is not an option. I imported the file to rebrickable but there I can't see a way to edit the file in rebrickable.

Help.

Classicsmiley

Are you saying that you are trying to find the piece in LDD? Did you try searching for 99010?

JamesJT

I tried searching for 99010, 99009, 4652236, 4652235 and "turntable" but it is just not in LDD.

Classicsmiley

Which mode do you have LDD in? Are you using the "Extended" palette?
If you click the View menu, and select New Themes > LDD Extended, you should then be able to successfully search for 99010.

JamesJT

...and there it is, in red! Thank you

Classicsmiley

Yes, Extended Mode will allow you to build with any piece in any color.

JamesJT

How do you get a 32269 20T gear to sit perpendicular to a 6589 12T gear in LLD?

graphite

You probably need to rotate one of them a hair. I think by default all the gears come out with a tooth at the 0 degree mark so you just need to rotate it to get it to fit with another one.

darthdc

New upgrades. A few new pieces that are handy, plus the PIECE OF RESISTANCE!!!!

pvp3020

Does anyone know how to place pieces that don't attach to anything else? Like the Speedorz sets for example, which have pieces resting on other pieces so that they can be easily knocked over. I've tried this in LDD without success, it simply won't let you place a piece on another piece without it being attached in some way.

graphite

You can't do it directly but you can be creative about it. If the top piece you are trying to place has studs on it somewhere, then you just have to build something next to the bottom part that you want to place the first part on so that you can attach the first part to it, thus suspending it over what you wanted to. Then you go back and delete the stuff you built (or leave it and hide it).

rocao

It's possible to manipulate bricks into position by having them attached to extra bricks, and then delete those extra bricks. I'm not exactly sure of the contact you are trying to achieve, though.

pvp3020

Great, thank you! That's given me some ideas.

^ I'm trying to achieve a couple of techniques that you can find on #10188. One is the door to the garbage crusher that slides on a floor of tiles. I solved this by replacing one of the tiles with a plate, which is ok as the plate is hidden beneath the door.

The other effect I'm trying to achieve is similar to the tractor beam power generator, with the round 2x2 bricks suspended upside down within a hollow 4x4 cone (#4742). I think the idea of attaching to extra bricks and then deleting those bricks should work nicely. :o)

graphite

^ Just remember that if you are designing to then order parts for it that you need to replace the plates you added (if you left them in) with tiles. For any of the things as long as you group sections (group tool) and move them as a whole you don't need to leave them with the temporary parts in. So you can put the tile back once you have the sliding door is in place, just don't highlight and move the door without moving the rest of it and it will stay together.

pvp3020

Thanks for the advice!

darthdc

Doing a better version of R2-D2 on LDD, but have already hit a snag. The pipes that come with the UCE R2-D2 are on LDD, but you can't even flex them! Had to use smaller pipes, which don't look as good.

graphite

^ The flex tool doesn't work on them? You can always just put the part in but not connected so that at least the correct parts are in the model. Unless you're just building it digitally and have no plans to build it.

darthdc

I'm just building it digitally for now. Its larger than the UCE version, and does have wheels in the feet. The body is 12 sided, using hinge plates, and allows for a more realistic body. Will likely use the same mechanism for the middle leg, but with the leg being thicker. Aside from that, I'm making it up as I go along.

rancorbait

Finally leaned how to use custom decals with LDD and Pov-Ray thanks to a guy on EB :o)

darthdc

Why don't we have a place here to show off any LDD creations?

rancorbait

@darthdc - LDD creations are just as welcome here as any other MOC.

JamesJT

Anybody know how to get the AAA 4x8x4 battery box on LLD?

Cheers

graphite

^ not sure it is in there. Think the rechargeable box is though. They are the same size.

JamesJT

I couldn't find any 4x8x4 box.

Is there anyway to edit/re-order the build guide? There is no way andybody could follow the instructions I have now.

GallardoLU

the instruction it generates is rather bazar, I've not found a way to re-order them. but I have noticed that rebuilding the model in the order I would expect it to be made helps (but does not completely fix) so I end up with 2 models and remove the first one.

beegeedee

If you want to control the order you really want ldraw along with lpub. It's harder to work with and slower too but you have better control over the instructions.

JamesJT

I tried building it in the right order but LLD still mixed it all up.
I am goimg to build 1 step at a time, go to guide page, take a screen shot and then put it all together in publisher.

ecmo47

Does LDD generate a parts list?

graphite

^ There is a separate program called LDD Manager that you can download that will generate parts lists, let you know if something doesn't exist in a color, let you know if a part isn't very readily available, and show you alternate colors for all parts in another color in your model. You can then export Bricklink wanted lists etc from it.

ecmo47

Thanks! Just created my first real model and could not find what I think should be a obvious funtion.

Aanchir

graphite said:

^ There is a separate program called LDD Manager that you can download that will generate parts lists, let you know if something doesn't exist in a color, let you know if a part isn't very readily available, and show you alternate colors for all parts in another color in your model. You can then export Bricklink wanted lists etc from it.

@ecmo47 You can actually generate a parts list in LDD without using LDD Manager. Just click File>Export BOM. This will generate a parts list as a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet (.xlsx). One advantage to this is it works on both the Windows and Mac versions of LDD, rather than just on Windows like LDD Manager. However, one disadvantage is that unlike LDD Manager, which bases its parts lists on the Bricklink database, LDD's bill of materials exclusively uses the official Design IDs, color codes, and part names used within the program. So if you want a parts list that's easy to turn into a Bricklink wanted list, LDD Manager is preferable.

If you build a model in the default LDD mode or Mindstorms mode rather than LDD Extended mode, the bill of materials will even include the Element ID (listed in the first column). However, if you switch to LDD Extended Mode while building, the Element ID information will be lost, frustratingly.

Here's one of my MOCs I built on LDD, and here's the bill of materials generated on LDD. I actually originally built the model on LDD Extended mode, so to include the Element ID numbers in the bill of materials I had to switch to LDD mode and use the paint bucket tool to replace all the parts from LDD Extended mode to ones from LDD mode. This assigned them the Element ID numbers they should have. In the end, there were still a couple parts that did not exist in LDD mode, so those do not have Element IDs in the final bill of materials.

ecmo47

Thanks a bunch! So how did you figure out that BOM = Bill of Materials? Next dumb question - how do you get to the "extended mode"?

ecmo47

^Never mind. Just re-read the thread!

graphite

^ BOM is a standard acronym for Bill of materials so if you work in any sort of engineering or manufacturing it is pretty commonplace.

ecmo47

Is there anyway to move a sub-assemble of parts? I any working on some train cars and it would be nice to move and clone groups of parts.

graphite

There is a group feature. Select the parts you want and create group from menu or ctrl-g. You can add and remove from the group and see groups on the group tab.

samiam391

Anyone else having a problem with LDD just consistently crashing and not responding?

canon03

Yes, due to high piece counts...especially when attempting to generate the HTML building guides. I usually save the original, then start chunking it up into smaller groups which helps a lot.

Aanchir

samiam391 said:

Anyone else having a problem with LDD just consistently crashing and not responding?

Used to happen to me on my PC with larger or more complex models. Doesn't happen to me on my Mac except sometimes when I use the flex tool. Be sure to save periodically, and always save before using the flex tool!

rancorbait

samiam391 said:

Anyone else having a problem with LDD just consistently crashing and not responding?

It has happened before, but it seems to usually be when I have other programs running, so I just shut off the programs that I don't need at the moment
and it works fine.

beegeedee

There's plenty of issues there. if you have a model with a large piece count it can often jump around when trying to place pieces too. MLCad may be slower but it handles larger models better. Shame the parts library is a little out of date there.

What I did recently was export to ldraw format and then fixed the missing parts.

darthdc

samiam391 said:

Anyone else having a problem with LDD just consistently crashing and not responding?

Was doing a super large model of Thunderbird 3, but had to give up due to the program shutting down. I managed to do a large model of Thunderbird 4 though.

darthdc

Thunderbird 4 images. To make the exterior and interior line up, the cockpit had to be lengthened to accommodate the compartment at the back (underwater hatch in roof). I tried to be as faithful to the craft as possible.

plasmodium

Wow - that's huge!

rancorbait

@plasmodium - That's what she......Naw, never mind.

;oP

JamesJT

How do change the lenght of the mini actuator in LLD? It is fixed at halfway as standard and I need one fully open and 1 one fully closed.

Thanks