how do you make miters in sketchup

larry merlau

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Delton, Michigan
i have spent over a hour trying and have had very little success. i made a long piece of trim and thought i could cut it to length like real wood but nope. watched 2 videos got it to almost work but it shrinks the trim width.. i am to old for this crap!!!
 
What is the profile? If all sides are flat I can help. If you need to section a complex profile . . . . calling Dave Richards, calling Dave Richards. :)
 
I am sure Dave will have better methods but this has worked for me.
1608306271818.png
from left to right ...
  1. draw your profile and push/pull to length needed .. or a little longer
  2. draw a square/rectangle bigger than the profile ... but do not attach it to the profile
  3. rotate the square/rectangle to the desired angle of the miter
  4. drag the rotated square/rectangle into the profile .. notice there are no lines shown where the square/rectangle intersects with the profile
  5. use the interest faces tool to intersect the square/rectangle to the profile
  6. use the eraser tool to erase the lines of the profile, square/rectangle that are beyond the miter
Hope this helps. Look forward to how Dave would do this.​
 
Sorry. Late to the party.

Robert's method is one good way to do it. If you are going to miter two pieces you could put the components together and use them as a guide for orienting the mitering rectangle. This is also useful when the angle isn't square as you don't need to calculate the angle. It's useful when the pieces aren't the same width, too.
miters.gif


If you need to make the neighboring piece, another way to do it is to create the frame with Follow Me use a path and a profile face. Then separate the parts into components. You may need to draw in some miter lines that won't be created when the extrusion turns the corner. Of course this also works nicely when the miter angle isn't a simple 45° cut.
Screenshot - 12_20_2020 , 6_59_50 AM.png

I use this method for crown moldings on case work, too. I did that for this cabinet but it would work equally well for moldings around a string of cabinets as you might add in a kitchen or a library of built-ins.

 
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thanks dave. do the parts have to be a group or can they be a componet? and what is the command or selection yu pick to give the cut face a face.. yu went to fast for me to see it:)
 
I use components always. They could be groups.

The process I used is to cut the rectangle to the clipboard, then open the component for editing and paste the rectangle in place. After selecting all of the geometry and using Intersect Faces, I erased the parts of the rectangle that stick up above the molding but this leaves the rest of the rectangle in place as the mitered face of the molding. I just made sure the face wasn't reversed at the end.

If you don't paste the rectangle into the component/group and just intersect the molding with model, the miter lines will be created but no face. You could use the Line tool to trace an edge to form the face if you want. That's not so bad for a flat mitered face but it would be a lot of work for a coped molding end as you might have with some moldings.
 
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