plines and circles - tutorials

Good day...This is my first visit here and I am hoping I may have found a resource to help me with recurring problems I am facing in my attempt to learn autoCAD. I am attending a technical school but, much to my surprise, it is pretty much a self-taught program. I am afraid I am having problems grasping even some of the basics but I cannot find any resources at my library, bookstore, or on the web. I have almost completed this particular assignment, but it took me several hours and I am quite sure it could have been done more easily and quickly. (possibly with pline) I used a series of circles which I then aligned and trimmed based on the diameters given in the problem. Can someone explain the better way to accomplish this and if I could use pline, precisely what steps are involved? Thanks so much.

dwg-24.dwg

Welcome to the forums yankee_dreamer!

Several ways to mission accomplished. One might be to look up the ARRAY command.

Try this link too and do have fun.

http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/course/48-568/2DVideosWEB_files/frame.htm

I won't be much help since I'm just learning myself, but if you are referring to the scallop pattern I think you'd be better off with using polar array, on my version in classic view its the little button with 4 boxes on the right side.

Probably a breach of protocol on this site to refer to another, but I found great tutorials on the basic functions at cadeeze . They have hi-res downloads and I spent the $10 for all of them. Best $10 I ever spent. But I'm pretty sure its all 2D and it looks like you are needing 3D.

I'm one who learns better seeing how it works, or is supposed to work, and then moving on to my own practicing of the commands. I work all in 2D so my application is pretty well defined as to what I need at this point.

Reading these forums and digesting some of the problems that the pro's define and solve is pretty mind boggling.

Note: this site won't let me post the link as a hotlink.

We haven't gotten to arrays yet, but thanks to both of you for the tips. Linda

Hello Linda

Welcome to the forum.

I took a look at your drawing, there are some errors that you need to correct.

Drawing objects are alot easier if you use "object snap". Please use the tutorials to help you understand how to use them.

http://www.cadtutor.net/tutorials/autocad/object-selection.php

Attached is a modified drawing showing the progression of my work flow.

I would recommend you redraw this object and make your corrections.

The more you practice the better you will become, your drawing speed will increase as you gain confidence.

dwg-24mod.dwg

Nice work Car5858! Practice does make perfect.

I've been at this for years however, never "wander." Simple plan and elevation views, advanced plumbing.

Linda, you certainly found THE correct forums for your reading, asking questions, sharing. We're all, always, learnin' more or renewing what we've forgotten.

Thanks Tankman, just trying to return the help everyone has given me for the past year.

Hello....It is fairly early in my course and we have not been taught to use object snaps (although they were mentioned). I would have asked my instructor for help but I have been missing class for a couple of weeks due to a scooter accident. (tried to channel Evel Knieval w/o success). I do appreciate everyone taking time to look at my drawing and offering suggestions, tips, tutorials, etc. I feel even more confident that this forum will be a big help to me as I move forward.

Thanks....Linda

Hello Linda

 

Welcome to the forum.

 

I took a look at your drawing, there are some errors that you need to correct.

 

Drawing objects are alot easier if you use "object snap". Please use the tutorials to help you understand how to use them.

http://www.cadtutor.net/tutorials/autocad/object-selection.php

 

Attached is a modified drawing showing the progression of my work flow.

 

I would recommend you redraw this object and make your corrections.

 

The more you practice the better you will become, your drawing speed will increase as you gain confidence.

Awesome Car!

Yankee, the quickest way to to create this, totally depends upon what kind of information you were given to work with.

One concern with what you did.. Your cutouts around the outside are at various "depths", or distances from the centerpoint. Since those cut-outs are all blocked together, it's possible that you inserted it with a centerpoint that didn't match the centerpoint of the object.

If it was an error during the creation/layout of the cut-outs, the array command would have prevented this. However, since you didn't use that, and didn't use any object snaps (endpoints, midpoints, centerpoints, etc) I'm at a complete loss at how you got as close as you did. It seems to be against the nature of using AutoCAD to not be using those for everything.

Unless you used grid snaps? but there's a centerpoint mark that's slightly off-center.. so you might have just gotten close visually instead?

I'm not sure if you used the offset command, but by offsetting the circle to the required diameters, you'd maintain the same centerpoint, and only draw one circle for the main body.

That would be faster, but it depends on what information you were initially given to work with. If you had all the diameters, you could do the math to determine the offsets, but then it might also become quicker to simply use the circle command and input the diameters.

Also, if you used snaps, you could have drawn lines from the face view (like at quad for the arcs, or intersections for the.. well.. intersections..) To help create the cross-section.

Anyways.. here's a step-by-step tut for the face view, which includes the introduction to a couple of commands you'll learn a little later. There's so many ways to do stuff in AutoCAD it's kinda' hard to suggest ways that don't rely on our favorite methods.

dwg-24-TUT.dwg

Well what I did was to make the circles using the diameters provided and visually line up the center points (the lines changed color so I figured I was pretty close to the center). Then I used the polar option to draw lines every 15 degrees. I then created a circle using the diameter provided and visually copied, aligned, and trimmed using the lines drawn at 15 degree increments to create the arcs. Based on suggestions of forum users I have done some studying on object snaps, offset, and other tools suggested and plan to redraw using those tools. Worst case scenario, my instructor will tell me what tools she wanted me to use if I have jumped ahead too far. Thanks again to everyone who has offered assistance.

Linda:)

Awesome Car!

 

Yankee, the quickest way to to create this, totally depends upon what kind of information you were given to work with.

 

One concern with what you did.. Your cutouts around the outside are at various "depths", or distances from the centerpoint. Since those cut-outs are all blocked together, it's possible that you inserted it with a centerpoint that didn't match the centerpoint of the object.

 

If it was an error during the creation/layout of the cut-outs, the array command would have prevented this. However, since you didn't use that, and didn't use any object snaps (endpoints, midpoints, centerpoints, etc) I'm at a complete loss at how you got as close as you did. It seems to be against the nature of using AutoCAD to not be using those for everything.

 

Unless you used grid snaps? but there's a centerpoint mark that's slightly off-center.. so you might have just gotten close visually instead?

 

I'm not sure if you used the offset command, but by offsetting the circle to the required diameters, you'd maintain the same centerpoint, and only draw one circle for the main body.

 

That would be faster, but it depends on what information you were initially given to work with. If you had all the diameters, you could do the math to determine the offsets, but then it might also become quicker to simply use the circle command and input the diameters.

 

Also, if you used snaps, you could have drawn lines from the face view (like at quad for the arcs, or intersections for the.. well.. intersections..) To help create the cross-section.

 

Anyways.. here's a step-by-step tut for the face view, which includes the introduction to a couple of commands you'll learn a little later. There's so many ways to do stuff in AutoCAD it's kinda' hard to suggest ways that don't rely on our favorite methods.

It is fairly early in my course and we have not been taught to use object snaps (although they were mentioned).

They haven't taught you about Osnaps yet? What are they waiting for? Osnaps are extremely impotant and they should have been discussed before any assignments were handed out.

Hey Linda and welcome to the forum.

I have renames your thread to something (perhaps) more suited -not at work right now so can't open your drawing. Please name your threads more descriptively in the future to aid the search tool.

...(tried to channel Evel Knieval w/o success)...

Now this sounds like a Chat-thread

I'd agree with that; drawing without object snaps is a HUGE no-no..

Though perhaps part of the exercise was designed to make you look-up snaps and see how/why they're desirable and useful, and what snaps are availible?

That teaching style can come back to bite you, because once you've instructed someone to draw without snaps, you'll forever be zooming in on their non-intersecting intersections and/or seeing little "nubs" hanging past an intersection on a print-out. (I swear that when you have a nub like that.. AutoCAD has always taken GREAT PAINS to make sure that nub shows-up clearly in all print-outs)

However, by the same token.. once you've drawn without snaps, and have seen what a mess you make, especially if you go to create a "hatch" at the end of a two-hour exercise in drawing an elaborate maze... maybe you don't skip 'em anymore..?