Trouble with layouts

Hey guys,

 

I've been having trouble with my layout, and my page size. I made my annotative drawing in model space, and when I'd go to paper space, the drawing would be wayyy too small on the page. I went to the page setup manager for the layout to modify it. From what I understand, there are 2 variables that I can change: Page size, and scale. I wasn't able to find a combination to make my drawing fill out the page. I see that the scale can be in either inches or mm. My drawing is in feet and inches, so I would select the inches, right?

 

In the end, I changed my drawing scale all together to make it fit the page size that I had, which likely wont be a feasible option very often. Is there a better way to approach this instead of basically blindly changing these options until I find a size that works?

 

Thanks

Welcome to Cadtutor

 

Starting from scratch, typically you'd switch to a Layout tab then use PAGESETUP to pick the correct size paper you plan to plot to.

Next, you'd create a viewport, at which point your model should appear in the newly created viewport. The only thing you should have to do after that to make a properly scaled plot is make sure the Viewport is active and use the Scale List box at the bottom in the AutoCAD Status bar to pick an appropriate scale for the Viewport.

 

Feel free to attach your drawing here, it's usually the best way to get the fastest and most accurate help. Also make sure you say what size paper you plan to plot to.

I have a feeling why your drawing was "WWWAY too small". There is some sort of drawing object floating way off in modelspace somewhere. The reason I know this is that the new or default viewport, on a layout always comes up zoomed extents on the modelspace objects. Every object in modelspace will be visible in the viewport, IF the zoomed extents is small enough to let the objects be large enough that they are even visible.

 

These flying objects usually result from a failed paste or insert attempt.

Hey guys,

 

I've been having trouble with my layout, and my page size. I made my annotative drawing in model space, and when I'd go to paper space, the drawing would be wayyy too small on the page. I went to the page setup manager for the layout to modify it. From what I understand, there are 2 variables that I can change: Page size, and scale. I wasn't able to find a combination to make my drawing fill out the page. I see that the scale can be in either inches or mm. My drawing is in feet and inches, so I would select the inches, right?

 

In the end, I changed my drawing scale all together to make it fit the page size that I had, which likely wont be a feasible option very often. Is there a better way to approach this instead of basically blindly changing these options until I find a size that works?

 

Thanks

There probably are more than 100 "variables" that can affect the way your drawing looks in paperspace. Don't go around "blindly" mucking with them. You are correct about the two "variables" you mentioned if you insert the words "should have to manipulate" into the sentence.

 

Be careful when using the word "variable" in a generic sense, around all the AutoCad geeks on the forum. In AutoCad the word "System Variable" means only one thing, and that is a system switch (Variable) that can be set to different values, which cause different results. If you use the word generically we will act like you suddenly started speaking Martian or something.

Hey guys,

 

In the end, I changed my drawing scale all together to make it fit the page size that I had, which likely wont be a feasible option very often. Is there a better way to approach this instead of basically blindly changing these options until I find a size that works?

 

Thanks

That could be tough to recover from. Do you know what scale factor you used. You are going to have to reverse that scale to recover.