Issues with the scale of my drawings...

Kia Ora...

I'm drawing architectural spaces... I've set my units to decimal / millimeters / 0... but when asked to enter say the length of a line I am prompted with single digit figures... when I enter 1000 (as in 1m) the line disappears off the page and I can't scroll to it or scroll the page down to fit! Also as an example when I pull one of the architectrual templates over like an I Beam or window or a symbol such as 'stairs' etc... they are huge also!

How do I set my page up or scales up so I can draw a 20m square space and see it on the page!?! I know it's got to be something simple but I'm stumped and can't get started! Help please...

R

OK, this is simple - it would appear that the Templete that you're using is zoomed up to a little area of say 10 Units by 8 Units. I use the term units because AutoCAD doesn't really care whether your unit of measurement is mm, inches, feet, metres, miles, cubits or whatever - we always draw in our chosen units. It is when you go to set up your layout that you then control how (at what scale) they're to plot out.

Now, zooming - it's your camera and how far away you are looking at it (how much you can see. In you case, I would suggest that your first step is to draw yourself a rectangle the size you want (in this case, 20,000 mm square). Start with the RECTANG command and tell it to be 20000,20000. Next use the ZOOM command and select the Extents option. You will then see your square ready to draw to your hearts desire inside...

Hope there's a start for you

Top man... as easy as that! Cheers Al

R

Now if you find that your blocks won't fit in your drawing as you've begun it, you need to have a look at the setting for your INSUNITS, and check it matches your drawing units (if you're not putting a metric staircase in an imperial drawing, in which case you can work that out :wink: )