electrical floor plan and lines

[buick455]

i have been editing my electrical floor plan and i have started drawing in the lines (like from one light to another) in the plans my architech drew (im useing his dxf files) he drew a dashed arc and then hoops over crossing wires.. (photo below)

 

for the life of me i cant re-create this.. i get a dashed line, but its one solid arc..

 

this is my first time really using Autocad so please go easy on me if its right infront of my face, lol

 

[kencaz]

The way I always do it is to just create all my arcs then just make one circle and copy it using the intersections of the lines as the center point, then just trim half of the circle on the desired side and line I want to show the cross-over.

 

 

This is good practice since it may and has prevented an electrician from putting in un-needed J-boxes.

 

KC

[Tommy78]

As an electrician myself i really don't understand why some people still draw lines to represent their circuits (architects do this all the time, doesn't mean you have to!).

 

Just name your lamps and switches according to the circuit they're assigned to or even a temporary number if you don't know yet.

For example; circuit A > lamp A.01, lamp A.02, switch A.S01.

 

This has the added benifit that your plan will be a whole lot cleaner.

[buick455]

(noob alert)

KC thats exactly what im lookin to do. im useing arc and the linetype that is dashed, but it isnt segmented so i can delete a dash or 2 to make my circle/hoop.. on the architechs plan the arc is a segmented line (like a poly) and i can delete dashes one by one. with mine i select a dash and it grabs the whole arc. I will try and get more pics, b/c i think this is a case of me just being stupid (happens time to time, lol)

[SPARKY77]

From the sound of it the architect has drawn the dashes seperatly in stead of using the dashed line type.

[Glen Smith]

(noob alert)

KC thats exactly what im lookin to do. im useing arc and the linetype that is dashed, but it isnt segmented so i can delete a dash or 2 to make my circle/hoop.. on the architechs plan the arc is a segmented line (like a poly) and i can delete dashes one by one. with mine i select a dash and it grabs the whole arc. I will try and get more pics, b/c i think this is a case of me just being stupid (happens time to time, lol)

 

Sounds to me like the drawings have been converted or something. You don't want to be able to select one of the dashes and delete it. You DO want to be able to select one dash and the whole line be selected. That way, if you want or need to move or delete the whole line, you select it once and do what needs to be done. Just like KC mentioned above, you put circles in and trim (MODIFY - TRIM) but you also want to take the next step and join the arcs and lines back together after you put in the arcs. Use the command PEDIT and join the lines and the arcs that you put in so that you can again select the entire wire by clicking on any part of it.

 

Glen

[buick455]

ok i think i got it..

 

it seems to be working the way i want, other then the fact that when i make my circle (for the hop over) it never wants to lock on the intersection of the lines.. always a bit off centered. The hardest part now seems to be gettin things done in the right order. Oh well, lol.. back to work

 

Thanks everyone