The spline joint is a very good way to preserve cross-section in posts receiving multiple beams. It can be adjusted to provide nearly any tension capacity. This routine allows the user to control all dimensions of the spline and location/size of the pegs, it over-cuts the spline mortise in the post when the spline is located on the top face to allow for shrinkage.
Mods
You can disable the insertion dialog and alter the default parameters to speed insertion if it's appropriate for work-flow in your office.
_bOnInsert is a predefined variable that is only true during initial insertion (or when explicitely reset)--this if statement defines the insertion routine. Line 48 calls the insertion dialog, comment ( preceed with a double slash, // ) or remove it to disable the dialog.
In this view of a top oriented Spline the reveal has been exagerrated for clarity. The far side of the spline has it's end and pegs offset-- assymetric splines are sometimes useful to prevent interference with other timbers or connections. The spline mortise in the horizontal timbers is also overcut to aid in assembly.
Properties declared with 3 arguements use the 2nd one as the default value. Properties with a set of discrete values use either the first value in the list, or an optional 4th arguement in their definition to define a default value. Here changing 0 to 1 in the definition of prLoc will cause the top orientation ( second item in the prstLoc list, meaning a zero based index of 1 ) to become the default.
Caveats
- The script is tolerant of horizontal beams of differing width, but these beams do need to have equal height.
- Many configurations are possible, but the combination of a symmetric length parameter and end offsets might not be the most intuitive to some. It does however allow quicker access/editing of the most common configurations.
- There is only minimal error checking, it is up to the user to make sure pegs aren't positioned off the end of the spline as an example.
