Text in Layouts

[poelcat]

I noticed a little thing. I like to place different details on the same sheet and many times they are different scales. When I set the scale the text scales with the view. Is there a way to prevent this?

[Curtis Johnson]

What I do to keep myself out of trouble when sending different scaled drawings/details to Layout is to do a File > Print > Page Setup and change the scale there before sending to LO. Then when you click on the Send To LO icon, the scale is properly set for that drawing or detail.

[lbuttery]

do a File > Print > Page Setup and change the scale there before sending to LO


Curt:

not sure why you are doing this ???

when sending to layout a DBX appears and you can change the scale right there

is your method a timesaver tip ???

Please clarify

Lew

[Gene Davis]

Allen Colburn Jr., a regular poster here, has a spreadsheet he offered that shows his settings for everything in dimensions and text, for each of the common scales from 1/16" = 1'-0" though full scale.

Everything gets sized . . . dims, text, arrows, dimension ticks, titles, bubbles, so that when you send a CAD detail to layout its stuff all matches the scheme set for the drawing layout, no matter what the scale used for the detail.

If Allen does not post it again here in a response in this thread, PM him and I'm sure he'll be generous and share.

[Glenn Woodward]

The only thing you can change in the layout is the dimension number height.
Select the Layout Box and open it's dbx. On the General tab is a setting titled Dimensions.
Otherwise, you need to set the correct size in your plan.

[poelcat]

Thanks for the reply's guys, however in my humble opinion the text should be set by the layout and I should not have to "jump through hops" to do a simple task. This is basic drawing/ cad stuff. Chief needs to get their act together for these types of things. Sorry if I offend you but this is nothing new. A drawing sheet of a certain size requires a certain text size, ANSI or ISO. This could be solved easily if Chief let you dimension when in the layout instead of the plan.

[Allen42acj]

Gene
That is Wendy's chart..
Think it is posted on here.
I have it printed out, not sure where it is to post..

[Doug Park]

Part of the issue of scaling text is layout of the text.

If you have sparse text that you want scaled then scaling it might come close to what you want.

However, if you have a lot of text scaling it can result in it overlapping things that you don't want. If you aren't all that picky about how your drawings look then I agree this could work. This is on our list of things to do, but is lower down the priority list than other things at the moment.

What we recommend is creating layers for text and dimensions for the various layout sizes that you will need. This way you can position them in a way that looks good for the scale you are sending to. Since the text you will be sending to layout for the various views, floor plan, framing detail, plot plan, etc. will usually vary anyway this is a good way of keeping things separate for the layout views yet scaled and positioned the way you want for that view.

We also provide a handy calculation tool in the text dialog for determining the size of the text you will need for a given scale.

[Allen42acj]

We also provide a handy calculation tool in the text dialog for determining the size of the text you will need for a given scale.

Can you explain more Doug?

[Gene Davis]

The manual is explaining what Doug is saying, at least that is what I think. Key in that desired text height of 1/8" for 1/4" scale, and the calculator returns with the 6" height.

Input 3/32" and you get your preferred 4-1/2".

[sherpa_jones]

However, if you have a lot of text scaling it can result in it overlapping things that you don't want. If you aren't all that picky about how your drawings look then I agree this could work. This is on our list of things to do, but is lower down the priority list than other things at the moment.

I think that what Doug is saying here is that if you use 6" text in all your views, and Chief automatically converts some to 8" text based on the scale, while the 6" text fit well around the drawing in the plan view, the change to 8" text in layout to keep text size consistend may cause the text to overflow into the drawings, creating a confusing and scrambled mess.

[Doug Park]

Thanks for clarifying what I said Rod. While the idea seems good, in practice it works only in a limited set of cases. There will still be cases where you will need to customize it for the view.

Even if the result were tolerable I would think that many would still find themselves wanting to tweak it to look better anyway.