Google SketchUp: The Missing Manual

Erasing Lines and Surfaces

Often when you modify existing shapes to create more complex shapes, you end up with extra, interior lines, like the diagonal running across the rectangle in Figure 2-6. A little cleanup with the Eraser tool (Tools → Eraser or E) takes care of the problem; just click the line you want to remove and it disappears.

You can erase a shape's face, too, but you can't do it with one click of the Eraser tool. If you could, it would be too easy to accidentally erase faces when you're trying to click edges! To erase a face, you need to choose a command from a shortcut menu, as shown in Figure 2-7. You can bring up the shortcut menu simply by right-clicking the face. (If you're on a Mac and don't have a three-button mouse, press Control as you click.) Shortcut menus, by the way, show commands related to the selected object or to the object immediately below the cursor. So, for example, you can access a command like Erase even when you're using a drawing tool.

Note

Shortcut menus are also called pop-up menus or context menus, because their commands are related to the item beneath the cursor.

Figure 2-7. To erase a face, right-click the face and then choose Erase from the shortcut menu. You can always erase lines and faces by using the shortcut menu, no matter what tool is selected.

To renew a surface that you've erased or that's disappeared while you were editing an object, ...