Discover the ease and precision that software-based architectural drawing and dimensioning provides compared to traditional manual methods. Learn how to manage layers, set the correct dimension style, and employ techniques to ensure accurate and clear dimensions in your architectural drawings.
Key Insights
- The article demonstrates the convenience of software-based drawing, discussing how it allows for precise dimensioning and eliminates the need for manual calculations that were prevalent in traditional methods.
- It provides detailed guidance on layer management for enhanced visualization, including making zero the current layer and turning off unnecessary layers to simplify the drawing process.
- The article emphasizes the importance of setting the correct dimension style, giving a step-by-step demonstration of how to set fit factors, adjust dimension spacing, and handle different scales for various parts of the building plan.
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Way back when, in the Dark Ages, people would draw their drawings by hand, if you can believe that or not, and one of the more challenging things to do was dimensioning, because people would frequently be approximating the placement of their line work, and they would have to come back and do all kinds of calculations when they were doing their dimensioning. Well, one of the things that's really wonderful these days is that since we draw our geometry exactly, dimensioning becomes a breeze for us. The important thing is making sure that when we dimension, we are dimensioning to the appropriate geometry.
With that in mind, what I want to do is to go on and set some layers and turn some geometry off. So, I'm going to begin by making zero our current layer, and I'm going to turn off the A-Wall Masonry layer, and I also have our pattern layer turned off, just so that life will be easier for us to actually see the geometry that we're going to be selecting. So, I've made zero the current layer for right now, and I've turned off the masonry layer, and I've turned off the pattern layer.
The first thing I would like to do is to bring in the no-plot view, and I need to draw a temporary guideline, so that I can appropriately position the no-plot view. So, I'm going to draw a line from the apparent intersection of this top line. You can see X dot, and I'm going to purposely choose down here on the wall, so you can see where my crosshairs are.
You can see over and to the right, it says intersection. If you look up, you can see the actual intersection point. I will draw it from there to the end of the bottom right.
I'm going to end up inserting my no-plot view at the midpoint of the angled line, and so when I do that, I'm going to purposely be selecting out here, so that the computer will go to the mid, as opposed to my needing to zoom in. So, insert Tab, insert command, I will go to browse, scroll down, I will choose no-plot view full. I will give it a scale factor of 48, because this drawing will be at a quarter inch equals a foot, so all of the drafting information is 48 times larger.
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Once again, we're going to end up putting this onto a sheet file, where the zoom factor is 1 over 48. I'm specifying insertion point on screen, I will go OK, and I will place it at the midpoint of that line. I will erase, home tab, erase the angled line, control S to save.
Now, what I need to do, is I need to make sure that my layers are correct, so for my dimensioning, I'm going to go to the a.ano.dims48 layer. You can see that we have annotation groupings for the dimension information, and for the symbols. So, what's going to be happening, is that our floor plan will be on the quarter inch, or 48 factor scales.
We will also have some enlarged plans at the 12 and 24 layer scale factors, and our roof plan will be at 96. So, I'm going to say a.ano.dims48 is my current layer, and the next thing I want to do is to make sure that I have the proper dimension style happening. So, I'm going to go up to annotate, so I'm going to go down to the little arrow that points to the right, and I will say tick 48, and I'm going to choose modify, and the big thing I'm concerned about is the fit factor.
So, as long as my fit factor is 48, we're going to be golden. So, we have our current layer as the annotation 48 layer. My current style is tick 48.
What we're going to be doing later on, when we get into our enlarged plans, is we will also be creating different annotative layers for the dimensions, so that we will have a scale factor of 24 for half inch, 12 for one inch, and 96 for eighth inch. So, I'm going to choose close. Everything's fine, and now I'm ready to start my dimensioning.
So, I'm going to start off with some strings on the top of the building. I'm going to do a linear dimension from the end of the house to the other end of the house, and I'm going to place this line right up here. Again, I have my running OSnaps on.
If you look to the right of where my crosshairs are, you can see the green icon for running OSnap event point. I'm going to zoom in a little bit. I'm going to do a linear dimension coming to the end of the building, to the end of the building, and I will place it right here, and then I'm going to do my continued dimension, and look at the handout, and make sure you're going to the appropriate face of the building, the right-hand face of the wall, and the end of the building.
Now, you can understand now, hopefully, why I had my A-Wall Masonry layer turned off, because otherwise my geometry would have snapped to that point. I'm going to come back in a linear dimension, end of here, end of the wall opening. I'm going to go up to here.
Again, my running OSnap will make it lock on top of that line. I will then continue to the end, to the end, and to the appropriate face of the window. Now, what I'm going to do here, this line here, again, don't worry about these lines here, because once we turn on our A-Wall Masonry layer, those lines will, in fact, line up properly.
Linear, end of here, end of here. I'm going to place my dimension string right about here, and then I will continue and keep going on either sides of my geometry, as I'm supposed to do per my handout. I have the one foot one and a half.
I'm going to go to here, here. I'm going to put this on another string in a moment, and I'm clicking my way across. Now, I'm going to take this three feet four and pull it up a ways, hit escape, and save the file.
Now, what I'd like to do is, when I have this dimension, I'd like to make sure that this dimension is maintaining the same space as I have between these. So, if I say, what's the distance between the magenta lines, you can see that I have a dimension string spacing of two feet between my dimension strings. So, I'm going to go to adjust dimension string spacing, and I'm going to read the prompt.
It says, where's a base dimension? Where's one that I like? And I like this guy here, and select the dimension(s) to space. I'm going to select this dimension that I want to space, and that's the only one I want to space. And it says, enter the value, which is my spacing value.
I'm typing in 24, so what it's now done is, it took that dimension and spaced it so that it's 24 inches above this one. I'm just going to stretch crossing, pull it back, so it's sort of weird. And so, I'm again going to go to my dimension string spacing, adjust spacing, and it's saying, where's the dimension base spacing? Where's one that you like? I like this guy.
Select the dimension or dimensions to space. This is the string that I want to have spaced away from my other string. It's asking me if I have others that I want to be similarly spaced.
The answer right now is no. I hit ENTER. It says, enter the value, which is the distance between the base dimension string and where I want to go.
While I'm here in this area, I'm just going to pick on this dimension, pick on the grip. Ortho is off. I'm just going to pull it over a bit, so that it's not hidden by anything.
Hit escape, control S to save. I'm just going to go draw a polyline very quickly from here, and I have my running OSnap on, so I need to be very careful when I'm working, because you can see that it wants to grab something. So, it wants to grab right there.
I'm going to press F3 to turn my running dimensions off. My running OSnap is off. Then, pick on the polyline, right-click, polyline, edit the polyline, and I can do a spline.
So, I'm now showing that the inch and a half goes to that value over there. I'm going to save this. I'm going to add a couple of other strings for the fireplace.
I'm going to go back to annotation, linear dimension, turn my running OSnap on with an F3 from the end of here, of this wall, to the end of the fireplace. Let it line up here, and then I could do a dimension continue, but the thing is, I already have this guy here, so I'm going to go back and do linear dimension from the end to the end, place it here, enter Control-S, and save the file. It's looking pretty nice, and so I think this video might be getting long, so I'm going to cut this video short for right now, and we'll come back and do some more dimensioning.
