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Headaches with Dynamic Zoom. Help!


ammobake

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So I've been here for a while. I am certified in Drafting Technology through the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. Since then I've been doing CAD for 7 yrs on multiple different CAD platforms/programs in the following disciplines..

 

-HVAC

-Designing portable military-grade carbon composite shelters for the military, CIA and other clients

-House plans from home through my own business

- Hundreds of sets of design and asbuilt drawings for government & military projects throughout Alaska.

 

You would think I would have this all figured out by now. But I don't! :lol:

 

My problem is this..

 

I copy a floor plan and paste it into model space in our drawing template. I then label my different plans in model space (because I'm a nerd) :geek:.

 

When I try to zoom in on a portion of the floor plan with the mouse wheel and then try to zoom out again, it only zooms out maybe halfway.

 

I can zoom extents just fine. I can zoom in just fine. Zooming out seems to be the issue. This happens when model space is in plan view.

 

The problem I'm having this time is with a pretty large floor plan (332'-2" x 169'-9"). I usually only have the dynamic zoom issue with these larger buildings.

 

Drawing limits are turned off so I know that isn't the problem.

 

Anyone know how to deal with this? Thanks in Advance. I'm always learning new stuff.

 

-ChriS

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It's not you, it's AutoCAD. It also does the same thing when zooming in.

 

Thanks Rob. I was wondering about that. I only have this zoom issue when dealing with large buildings.

 

At first I was thinking it was my computer. But my computer is only a few months old - pretty much brand new. I have a rockin video card, a bank of four monitors and I've had no Autocad annoyances other than this since I got the new comp (The computer details in my profile out of date tho).

 

Some of the floor plans I get from the government are in 3D. Could that be part of the problem?

 

Do you think Autocad is trying to handle too much data when using dynamic zoom or something?

 

-ChriS

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i could be wrong about this because it has been a long time i have had to do it. but i think if you type "LIMITS" into tthe command line and then type "OFF" it should fix this. if you change this in your template also it should men you will never have the problem again. from memory it is to do with the "drawing limits" set in CAD. so you could in theoy set the limits to say the size of an A3 sheet and you would know your drawing will always fit on your page if zoomed to extents. but i have no idea why this would actually be used any more.

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Occasionally this happens to me, usually when going from working on small drawing areas to large, or large to small.

 

I use the Z or ZOOM command. It brings this up in the command line: [All/Center/Dynamic/Extents/Previous/Scale/Window/Object] :

 

In your case it is having trouble zooming out, so I would start by trying 0.1 in the command line. If that is not enough I would repeat at 0.01 and so on until it zoom out to an acceptable amount.

 

If your drawing won't allow you to zoom in far enough you can do the same but use 10 then 100 and so on.

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Z E will zoom extents straight away and you (should) be able to zoom in from there. i can't sayi have ever had an issue with not being able to zoom IN far enough though...

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Surveyors work in metres on all our models. Architects work in millimetres. We tend to run into these issues whenever we are importing from architectural consultants.

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This issue is completely separate from drawing limits, although the limits being on might make it appear the same.

 

The issue is that AutoCAD simply has to forget the rest of the screen image when zoomed way into a complicated drawing and cannot redisplay the whole thing in small increments when you attempt to zoom back out. There just isn't room in physical memory for that sort of constant recalculation. Use the Regenerate all function to recover. That is what it's there for. This is not a "Problem". This is how it works.

 

Zooming to extents merely returns to the baseline image as it were. No math required for that.

 

It is sorta like, how do I get my car to back up again? Use the Reverse gear, It helps.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks everyone for your recommendations!

 

Like TLRstacker sais I can easily zoom extents when the problem occurs and then zoom in again from there. Sometimes after that the dynamic zoom (mouse wheel zoom) problem will come back but usually it won't. That's what caused me, at first, to think it was perhaps something hardware related. Especially since the problem only happens with some of these really big floor plans.

 

The drawing had ALOT of data in it at first. These government drawings sometimes contain alot of 3D data consisting of polylines for the floor plan (2D) with 3D faces for walls, windows, doors, openings, etc..

 

To get past the issue of the data I exploded everything. Then I used the "Front" view control from the 3D orbit drop down menu and deleted all the 3D content. I then manipulated the layers to jive with our company's layer template/layout.

 

The drawing now has MUCH less data than before and the file size is also much smaller and more manageable.

 

Since I did this I haven't had the problem return..

 

Like Dana sais, it is probably related to physical memory (hardware) but when I was having issues with it last week the regen function didn't help. However, the problem hasn't returned since I removed all the 3D objects I didn't need which tells me Dana is right about it being a memory issue.

 

-ChriS

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