Scale/Dim/Paperspace

Hi,

I have a very simple drawing and I am extremely messed up here!

Something is wrong somewhere and I don't really know where. Dimensioning is creating HUGE hashes, my drawing is appearing TINY on the paperspace and I am just spinning my wheels.

I am brand new and something is definitely setup wrong. Would anyone mind having a look at the attached drawing of a countertop and point me in the right direction?

001 Countertops.dwg

Looks like you drew to a scale. Always draw to true size in MS. If the wall is 5" thick then you draw with 5" between lines defining the wall, etc. Then the viewport can be scaled to show the size needed.

How do I check modelspace scale and reset it to 1:1?

And then I'll need to fix the drawing, tips on how to do that without redrawing?

OK. Your drawing units are set to Architectural and Precision is set to 0'-0 1/16".

I'm going to take a wild guess here and say that you used a scale of 1/2"=1'-0" in which case to get the dimensions to measure what they would be in the real world, and at a scale of 1:1, you will have to scale the entire drawing by a factor of 24. This would mean your interior walls would be 4 3/4" wide and the front-to-back measurement of the counter, to the left and to the top of the drawing, come out to 2'-0 9/16". Does that sound about right? The width of the exterior walls would be about 5 11/16".

What is throwing me off however are your dimension styles. I see that one of them is Annotative UK. So my questions are as follows.

1. Is this really supposed to be a metric drawing?

2. Given that you drew this "to scale" what scale were you using?

Here's a "wild guess". I can't download the drawing at work so I can only guess.

Interior walls should be 4 1/2" if one is using standard 2x4's and 1/2" GWB sheets, so I am guessing the scale factor is 25.4 and it is accidental because the template is metric. (12 units does not equal one foot) One can change the dimension style units to architectural (imperial only) even though the drawing units are millimeters, I believe.

the 25.4 factor seems to work, although the OP is not being very accurate with the layout. Now if this is supposed to be metric, done in MM then the title block also has to be drawn to MM and not inches. Currently it measures approx. 33x23. The OP needs a class from someone or some place, getting the basics down is too important to know before trying to do other work.

Here is what I did :-

1. Change unit to decimal (units)

2. Scale model space drawing using reference option (interior wall thickness to 110MM)

3. Scale title block 25.35 (Scale factor)

4. Delete current viewport

5. Creat new viewport (MVIEW)

6. Size new viewport to fit in title block

7. Zoom drawing in viewport and lock.

Why not just run -DWGUNITS?

why not just run -dwgunits?

Thanks for all the help so far. I haven't had any time to look at this yet but to clarify my intents.

I originally drew this to scale 1:1 in Architectural units accurate to 1/16th of an inch. I am not sure how the drawing got messed up. When I get home I am going to check the original on the main computer.

The interior wall is 5" thick... I sorta picked 6" for the exterior wall randomly as I didn't know and it wasn't important. I haven't made any distinction in the drawing between the two. The N-S wall should be/was 5" thick.

A scale factor of 25.4 seems to get me close, perhaps 25.35 is the sweet spot as suggested?

Luckily I am working as an amatuer for my own interests! haha Clearly I need some resources on how to setup an Architectural drawing.

I'm going to have a close look at this Monday morning.

It just so happens that 25.4 millimeters equals 1 inch. Strange that a drawing supposedly done using imperial (i.e. - U.S.) architectural units turns out to needs to have a metric scale factor applied to be dimensional correct.

If you are going to pursue CAD beyond just this one drawing I'd recommend learning the basics of AutoCAD before going any further. In the meantime, just for learning's sake, ditch this drawing and start over by putting in the correct dimensions to begin with rather than trying to draw "to scale". That method has basically gone the way of the dodo bird when it comes to cad.

Ok, so I have returned home and I can comment further on this whole this.

Here's the story:

I remote logged into my computer at home while gone to work on some drawings. Basically I just copied the files over an added them to a new project on the second computer. Something about that didn't go over well though. A lot of the files came out a little funky. As per what I posted above the scale is all messed up. I do have an original drawing here that is totally fine and normal. It is drawn at 1:1 in MS and looking good. So I guess no worries? I am still not really sure what went wrong with moving the files over. I am going to guess something about creating the new project didn't go over well.

So thank you all for your help. I think I have learned something here... lol I am not exactly sure what though.

You must have created a new project using a metric template and copy&paste your imperial drawing into it.

You must have created a new project using a metric template and copy&paste your imperial drawing into it.

I do believe that is exactly what I did. I've setup autodesk360 to help with this.

If I have an "accident" like this and my drawing is ruined I'll be very sad. Is there a method to automagically hold revision history or regular backups?

Sadly I only have access to Cad 2014 Architectural. I think some of the more modern suites have much more robust systems for dealing with this, correct?

It has nothing to do with revision history, regular backups or robust systems. This is what I call an OIE or Operator Induced Error. You did not pay attention to what you were doing and you messed up. Don't go looking to blame AutoCAD. Accept the fact and learn from your mistake.

Since ReMark is struggling with reading comprehension or is just a born asshat I'll restate the question.

"Is there a method to automagically hold revision history or regular backups?"

Most companies back up files twice a day, at least the ones I have worked for. If IT doesn't do that for you then you will have to do it yourself, probably manually copying files once or twice a day. Windows keeps previous versions of the folder and files, at least here it works. Navigate to the folder with Windows file explorer, right click on the folder, pick Previous Versions, see what is in there.

Stop blaming the program for your mess up. If you hadn't inserted the drawing you received in the wrong template file you could have avoided the problem altogether. Did you expect the program to give you some sort of warning message?

Creating backups of a drawing is your responsibility as is knowing what features a program has or doesn't have such as revision history. Did you conduct an Internet search on the program and said feature such as..."autocad architecture"+"revision history" or something similar?

AutoCAD Architecture - To Display Projects by History....

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/autocad-architecture/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2017/ENU/AutoCAD-Architecture/files/GUID-C461BF4B-973C-45F1-93F0-3CFEA1CF74C1-htm.html

Understanding AutoCAD backup and autosave files...

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/autocad/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Understanding-AutoCAD-backup-and-autosave-files.html

AutoDesk Vault...if you really need to track revision history.

http://www.autodesk.com/products/vault-family/overview

Bottom line. We all mess up one time or another. I know I have. What's important is that we learn from our mistakes. BTW...there is no need for name calling.