AutoCAD^? Tricks and Tips

Author Miles

Note: Although these tricks have been tested on AutoCAD LT^? 2000i, they should work on most other versions.

AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT are registered trademarks of Autodesk Canada Inc./Autodesk, Inc. in the USA and/or other countries.

Contents

• 1. How to get brick hatching to show standard brick dimensions

• 2. How to stretch something along one axis only

• 3. How to get superscript text with an AutoCAD font

• 4. How to make plotted line types ISO compliant

• 5. How to show dimensions in both metric and imperial units

1. How to get brick hatching to show standard brick dimensions

(In the UK, standard bricks are 215mm long by 65mm high, and brickwork is usually constructed with 10mm mortar joints, depth of one course therefore=75mm).

Use the hatch pattern AR-BRSTD, and a scale of 1.10721. Note that the MEASUREMENT system variable must be set to 1 (metric).

With this scale, the lines in the hatch pattern roughly coincide with the centres of the notional mortar joints. This is not spot on, but for most applications any error will be negligible.

2. How to stretch something along one axis only

Make the objects into a block. Then delete the old objects, and insert the new block in their place. When inserting the block, you can specify different scales in the X and Y directions.

This trick is useful if you want to show brick hatching on an elevation that is not perpendicular to the paper, e.g.:

This effect was obtained by first hatching an outline of the wall on a perpendicular view, then making the hatch into a block and inserting at the relevant X scale onto the elevation above. Any discrepancy can be remedied by exploding the block and trimming lines by hand.

3. How to get superscript text with an AutoCAD font

(For example, N/mm?)

Type in ?N/mm2^ ?. Include an extra space after the ?^?.

Select the ?2^ ?, including the extra space.

Now click the stack button ():

4. How to get ISO compliant line types

BS EN ISO 128 ? Part 21¹ gives standard configurations for the ISO line types. For example, Line type No. 04 is defined as follows:

1. BS EN ISO 128 Technical drawings - General principles of presentation - Part 21: Preparation of lines by CAD systems : 2001

These standard configurations can be loaded into the Linetype Manager; they are included with AutoCAD in the linetype file aclt.lin.? The linetypes are named ACAD_ISOxxW100, where xx is the ISO line type number. More information about the use of ISO line types in conjunction with the different allowable widths can be found in other parts of ISO 128, for example, Part 23: ?Lines on construction drawings? recommends the following:

The following two steps should be taken to ensure the correct configuration is obtained on plotted output:

1. In the Linetype Manager, click the checkbox titled ?Use paper space units for scaling?.

2. The linetype scale should be set to be the same as the pen thickness. For example, if the colour green plots as a 0.35mm pen thickness, then the linetype scale for green objects should be set to 0.35.

5. How to show dimensions in both metric and imperial units

This procedure assumes that the object is drawn in millimetres in model space. There are 25.4 millimetres in 1 inch, therefore you need to enter the multiplier as 1 / 25.4 = 0.03937.

Now when dimensioning, the alternative units will appear in brackets after the primary units.

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