Outside Boundary

Hi,

Just wondering if I can get a boundary from the outside of an object. I have a 2D drawing of an engine+gearbox as a block and the need the outline.

Regards

Matho

You could try REGION but you have to select the boundary...

another way would be to hatch the area with RETAIN BOUNDARY on,

creating a polyline or region boundary, just by selecting an internal point.

G'day, Matho,

I think the command is BOUNDARY.

theres probably a better way than this but anyway,

draw a rectangle around your engine gear box drawing size doesnt matter as long as its bigger than your drawing

then use the command "BPOLY"

in the dialog select pick ponit n pick a point in between the rectangle n your drawing

then select ok

you should now have a poly line around the outline of you engine n gear box

Why have I always got to do things the long way ,

matho the command is BOUNDARY, (Alan is right again )

I'm just glad I didn't start trying to write a Routine that acad already has a command for & has had for along time...

I know the boundary command " bo " but doesn't that only work when you click in the interal part on the object?

As you can see the engine is quite detailed internally and it should look the one on the right

I've only been drafting for 6 months and i'm still a noob.

thanks for you replys

thats why i said to draw a rectangle around it first n then wen u use the BOUNDARY or BPOLY command select in between ur drawing n the rectangle

altho u would think there would be a way to select the outer boudary any1 know?

Matho, what azzro is getting at , is that `BOUNDARY' or `BPOLY' also

detects islands (the inner bit)..

although going on my previous posts what do I know

Thanks mate, trying that now.... autocad has frozen up but i'll be patient and see what the out come is.

Azzro, I'm not sure that will work. I think it may produce a boundary on the "inside" of the rectangle.

But then again, I just tested it, and it looks like it will work. Doing it your way produces two boundaries (using BOUNDARY command). One to the inside of the rectangle, and one to the outside of the motor.

Matho, go with Azzro's suggestion.

yeh i thought that two at first Allan but gave it a go n what do u know she worked

still think there must be a way to us BOUNDARY or a similar command on the external of objects tho

i've tried BO with a rectangle twice and auto cad keeps on freezes up. Any other thoughts. Maybe my Computer is to slow that command?!

Okay, a couple of things to try first. Purge the drawing, then do an AUDIT on the drawing. Then even purge again. Then try the BOUNDARY command. See if that helps.

You may also need to close down any other applications you have running, to free up some RAM.

even save it to a new file in put everything on layer 0 n purge out the rest, every little bit counts

I'm go to have to delete the inside lines via edit block in place. The drawing is too detailed and complex but i'll keep the drawing a rectangle trick in mind for next time.

thanks

Why not _WBLOCK your Engine to a new drawing (or Copy/Paste if you like) and try to do the boundary command there. Then delete everything but the profile and insert it as a block?

In my experience, it also helps when you zoom out a lot (so that you only see a tiny image) . Then acad finds the boundary much faster, and it doesn't display the message "no valid boundary found" less often...

Now, I am looking for a single command to do an outer boundary too. It is such a work around to draw a circle around the objects first. But I do understand the complexity, acad must find an island in an infinite emptyness (I don't know if I express myself clearly in English, sounds a bit like star wars) Isn't there another way to limit the "island search" area, in stead of drawing of circle? For example with selecting the objects that you want to have a border line around (doesn't work for me)?

Thanks,

Lode

Why don't you try lineworkshrinkwrap

you select all your entities in the view the ntype lineworkshrinkwrap

this will put a closed polyline around your entire selection and you can work from there

This seemed like a magic command, but alas, I assume you use autocad civil 3D. For us, it's not available.

Grrrr, I hate it that acad is restricting things like this. As if I can persuade my boss to pay how much? 5000euro or something to draw a line faster. I wonder when an enthousiast will make a great open source cad program

Thanks anyway, I am jealous now !

Wow, it's "resurect old threads day"

Have a look at this:

http://www.theswamp.org/index.php?topic=26664.0