![autocad drawing unit autocad drawing unit](https://www.archblocks.com/images/managed/Units_Metric_Solution-2.jpg)
So, the next time that international project throws you a curve, you’ll know what to do to quickly make it more successful.A man using AutoCAD 2.6 to digitize a drawing of a school building.ĪutoCAD was derived from a program that began in 1977, and then released in 1979 called Interact CAD, also referred to in early Autodesk documents as MicroCAD, which was written prior to Autodesk's (then Marinchip Software Partners) formation by Autodesk cofounder Michael Riddle. I hope we’ve given you some insight into metric vs. But times change, and as it developed its reach worldwide, methods for using the metric system were developed. After all, it was developed in the U.S., and as such, its initial user base used feet and inches. It’s really no surprise that AutoCAD is tailored more towards imperial units than metric.
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Final Thoughts on How to Use Metric and Imperial in AutoCAD It may not be perfect right away, but it sure beats re-dimensioning and annotating from scratch. Even so, make sure to check your drawing carefully, as your annotation’s placement can sometimes be off. You can assign the new scale to them, and they’ll scale up or down appropriately. This is why I suggested that you make your Styles annotative. But, if you’re further along and you have dimensions, text, and other annotations in it, they will get scaled too, making them either 25.4 times too big or 25.4 times too small. Sounds pretty straightforward, right? It is, as long as you’re only dealing with drawing elements. Also, come up with a naming convention that not only sets them apart from your imperial styles, but also tells you what they are (e.g., Gen_Notes_3mm) and setting to be Annotative. Assign your new Metric Text styles to these. Make sure you create new styles for Dimensions, Multileaders, and Tables if necessary. We’ll get to how those are calculated in the next section. Please note that the imperial equivalents shown are approximations. Do not alter your office standards! Create new styles for your metric project. So, the next important part to setting up your metric environment are your styles. That’s exactly how our previous example is set up.
![autocad drawing unit autocad drawing unit](https://cadbull.com/img/product_img/original/One-Unit-Apartment-Design-With-Working-Dimension-Drawing-AutoCAD-File--Mon-Dec-2019-05-58-08.jpg)
In other words, you can have your drawing set up to be metric, but the DIMSTYLE is set to Architectural. Dimension Styles have their own Units setting that is independent from the overall drawing units. You’ve verified that your UNITS are set to Decimal with zero places of precision. You make sure your DIMSTYLE is set to the office standard, place your first linear dimension, and it displays as feet and inches. You live and work in the U.S., so you’re used to feet and inches (imperial), but you’ve set your drawing up to be based on one unit representing a millimeter, and now you’re ready to dimension it. Now let’s say you’re at the stage where your metric drawing is complete. How to Show Metric and Imperial Dimensions in AutoCAD It’s in your head as you draw (and hopefully on a title block somewhere), as you make that same line 12 units long whether you mean for it to be 12mm, 12m, or 12km. Nothing in AutoCAD will tell you what that unit relates to. Don’t forget to set the appropriate decimal accuracy for your desired units. It may be a millimeter, a meter, a kilometer, etc. Since we want to use metric, you’ll need to decide prior to drawing anything what a unit will represent.
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AutoCAD gives you free will to make that unit whatever you want.
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The HELP file goes on to say: “The other formats can represent any real-world unit.” This is where you and your needs come in. Draw a line 12 units long, query it with LIST or PROPERTIES, and it will show as 1’.
![autocad drawing unit autocad drawing unit](https://www.planndesign.com/sites/default/files/dwgs/2015/12/02/image1_166.jpg)
This is where AutoCAD tries to do some thinking for you, and it is best described directly from the HELP file: “The Engineering and Architectural formats produce feet-and-inches displays and assume each drawing unit represents one inch.” You’ve probably experienced this in either of these formats.