Gain a step-by-step insight on adding dimensions and multileaders to your architectural drawings using the Annotate tab and Linear Dimensions. This guide elaborates on how to accurately place dimensions, baseline options, multileaders and how to save your work effectively.
Key Insights
- The process begins by drawing dimensions through the dimension layer, selection of the Linear Dimensions under the Annotate tab, and accurately placing dimensions at the quadrant of your choice.
- In addition to dimensions, multileaders can be added by changing the layer to S-Foundation Text and using the Leader option on the Home tab. It's crucial to ensure that the leader line is dragged far enough for the accurate placement of the second point.
- After making the necessary additions, it's important to save your work using Control-S. This ensures that all changes are securely stored and accessible for future use or modifications.
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In this video, we are going to add our dimensions and MultiLeaders. To begin, let's draw our dimensions.
I'm going to go to the Dimension Layer, S-Foundation Dims, and you can see that we only have six dimensions in this drawing. I'll go to the Annotate tab and choose Linear Dimensions. In this case, let's start with these circles—the drains.
They're from the corner of the building here to the Shift + Right-click → Quadrant, and make sure you Zoom way in and choose the bottom quadrant. In this case, click to place, and then I'm going to do another dimension, but this time I'm going to choose Baseline. The Baseline option will start from the same starting point we just set and will allow us to place another dimension at the Shift + Right-click → Quadrant up here.
Enter to say that I'm done. And you can see that if I continue, it will continue placing dimensions along that first point and jumping down the distance set in our Dimension Style Manager. So I'll hit ENTER to say that I'm done.
Enter again. And now I'll do one more Linear Dimension. I'll choose here, Shift + Right-click → Quadrant.
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This time it's the left quadrant of this circle. I'm dragging to the left and click to place. Once again, I can do Baseline and choose the Shift + Right-click → Quadrant on the left of this circle.
Enter to say that I'm done. Zoom Extents, Control+S to save. Finally, we are going to add the 24-foot and 20-foot dimensions just so that it's obvious how big the building is to the foundation—for the structural workers.
So I'll go Linear, Endpoint to Endpoint, and I'll choose this third line here. Linear, Endpoint to Endpoint, and the third line again. Zoom Extents, Control+S to save.
Now we can add our MultiLeaders. Before we do that, let's change our Layer to S-Foundation Text. Again, we can use the Leader option here on the Home tab.
I'll Zoom in up at the top. I'll pick this point right here and place my MultiLeader here. Now you can see if I place this Leader line too short, the arrow disappears.
So it's important to drag far enough away so that we can place the second point. Enter to say I'm done. And now I can simply type: 18 inches wide, lowercase X, 12 inches deep concrete grade beam.
Remember, don't hit ENTER to split this into two lines. Rather, dragging the grip will allow us to adjust the width of the text box. I'll close the Text Editor.
And again, at any point, you can click the front Grip to change where the arrowhead sits, and the other Grip to move the text. Let's add our next MultiLeader for the rebar. Again, I'll go to the Leader tab, choose the Leader command.
I'll choose an intersection here, and in this case, I'll Shift + Right-click → None just to make sure I don't grab any Object Snaps. I'm going to bring my Leader point here, Enter to lock it in, and this is: 3-1/2" concrete slab with 12" X 12" typical 3/8" rebar. You'll notice that my 3/8" stacked, and you can click it and hit the lightning bolt icon to Unstack.
If you want to turn that off permanently, you can change the Stacking Properties. Again, I'm going to drag this out so that it matches the two lines we see on our handout and click. Now, I would like these two to line up a little better, so I'm going to move this one so that it's just in line with the word "concrete, " and I could even move the other one so the "18-inch" is slightly more aligned with the "3-1/2."
Perfect. Now, I'll come down into here, and you can see this is where the text goes for our next MultiLeader, and it connects to both circles. So let's go Leader. Just start with one circle.
I'll pick the Shift + Right-click → Center this time, and I'll place my MultiLeader point here, Enter to lock it in, and this is: 2-inch drain typical. Now, in this case, I'll move the text slightly closer to both objects, and I want to add a Leaderhead for this circle. I can do that by picking on the text, right-click → Add Leader, and then simply coming down and picking the Shift + Right-click → Center of this circle. Enter to say that I'm done, and Enter one more time, and Enter again.
There we go. Escape, Escape, Escape. Zoom Extents, and Control+S to save. In the next video, we will create the S100—the Structural 1.0 sheet file.
See you there.
