Autodesk AutoCAD AutoCAD Architecture - 2008 Getting Started

AutoCAD Architecture 2008

Getting Started with AutoCAD Architecture

March 2007

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Chapter 1 Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Using this Guide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Opening the Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Managing Your Drawings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Creating Spaces to Calculate Floor Plan Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Creating Color-Filled Presentation Plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Laying Out a Floor Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Creating Schedules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Making Floor Plan Revisions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Creating a Section . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Detailing Your Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Contents | iii

iv | Contents

Getting Started

Welcome to AutoCAD® Architecture 2008! In this short tutorial, you learn how

to use the features of AutoCAD Architecture to design and document a small office

building. Working from a two-dimensional AutoCAD floor plan sketch, you

quickly create a presentation plan, a floor plan layout, door and window schedules,

a section, and a detail, all within a coordinated set of drawings.

You see how a more powerful AutoCAD®, with features and content specialized

for use by architects, can help you increase productivity. When you design in

AutoCAD Architecture, you use objects that represent real-world components,

such as walls, doors, and windows. These objects contain information that allows

them to function like the real-world components that they represent and to relate

intelligently to each other.

In addition to your main design tasks, many background tasks, such as layering

and scaling, are automated as you design and document your drawing set. A

simple tool, called the Project Navigator, allows you to easily work with all the

drawings in a project, eliminating the need to set up and maintain a complex file

structure.

Using this Guide

To complete the tutorial in this guide, you must have AutoCAD Architecture installed on your system. As you progress through the tutorial exercises, you access tutorial drawings and other content from the default installation directories.

If you cannot locate a file in the location that this guide suggests, it may be installed in a different location. Contact your CAD Manager for more information.

Imperial and Metric Convention

The exercises in this guide contain both imperial and metric values. This means that when you see an imperial value, a metric value is displayed in square brackets next to it.

For example: Add a 6' X 6' [1800 mm X 1800 mm] window centered in the top wall of the stairway.

All audiences using imperial measurements should use the imperial values only. All audiences using metric measurements should use the metric values in brackets only. Note that the imperial and metric values are not direct conversions, but appropriate values for completing either the imperial or metric project.

Opening the Project

In this exercise, you start AutoCAD Architecture, learn how to access AutoCAD Architecture learning resources, and open the project that contains the drawings you use to complete the tutorial. In AutoCAD Architecture, you use projects to store and manage all the drawings that you create to design and document your projects.

1 Start AutoCAD Architecture.

2 If this is the first time you have opened AutoCAD Architecture, a Welcome screen displays.

3 On the right side of the screen, under Essential Task Movies, click each title to view 2 minute long movies

that present the concepts you need to know to perform common design and documentation tasks in AutoCAD Architecture.

The movies match the exercises in this guide, so you can benefit from both conceptual and hands-on learning.

4 On the left side of the screen, explore the additional learning resources available to you:

■ Click User Interface Overview to interactively explore the AutoCAD Architecture user interface.

■ Click Learning Resources to access customized learning paths for different types of users, including

new and upgrading users.

■ Click New Features Workshop to view short animations that describe the new features in this, and

recent releases of AutoCAD Architecture.

■ Click AutoCAD

design and documentation tasks using the features and workflow of AutoCAD Architecture.

5 After you view the movies and other learning resources, click Next to display the Workspaces screen.

2 | Chapter 1 Getting Started

to AutoCAD® Architecture Task Comparison to learn how to accomplish typical

On this screen, you can choose the workspace that you use to begin your project. Each AutoCAD Architecture workspace includes the specific user interface components that you use in the appropriate phase of your project. For example, the Design workspace contains all the basic tools that you need to create building components in your design drawings.

After you close this screen, a Workspaces toolbar, located under the drop-down menus at the top of the screen, lets you switch between workspaces.

6 In the top box on the left side of the Workspaces screen, select Design.

7 If you do not want the Welcome and Workspaces screens to display each time you start AutoCAD

Architecture, select Don’t show me this again.

8 Click OK.

9 Open the tutorial project:

■ On the Navigation toolbar, click (Project Browser).

You use the Project Browser to create, copy, and switch between projects.

■ In the left pane, click , and scroll up to view the current file path and folder.

By default, the path and folder is C:\My Documents\Autodesk\My Projects. This is where the project file that you open and use for this tutorial is located.

■ In the left pane of the Project Browser, double-click the project, Getting_Started_I [Getting_Started_M].

The project displays in bold type to indicate it is the current project. The right pane of the Project Browser displays the project bulletin board, which can be used to communicate information about the current project.

■ Click Close.

Two important workspace features display: a Getting_Started project tool palette and the Project Navigator.

The Getting_Started project tool palette contains all the AutoCAD Architecture tools that you need to complete the exercises in this guide. Tools are objects that you use to draw in AutoCAD Architecture, and they are arranged on tabbed palettes. The tool represents the real-world object that you want to add to your drawing.

Using the Project Navigator, you create, access, and organize drawings in the current project within the software environment.

Managing Your Drawings

In this exercise, you learn how AutoCAD Architecture project drawings are organized and managed. The Drawing Management feature in AutoCAD Architecture lets you distribute your building geometry amongst a number of drawing files and manage them with the Project Navigator, where in the past, you may have used Microsoft® Windows® Explorer and the AutoCAD Xref Manager.

To store and manage these drawings with this feature, you first create a project. In the project, you create the basic levels (floors) and divisions (wings) of the building model to create a matrix of locations where you can assign the drawings that contain the geometry of your model.

Using enhanced AutoCAD Xref technology, drawings that contain the building geometry can then be referenced together, and views of the building can be created and referenced onto plotting sheets. Depending on whether they contain building geometry, assemble views of the building, or contain plotting sheets, project drawings are classified within projects as constructs, elements, views, and sheets.

1 On the right side of the screen, view the tabs on the Project Navigator.

Managing Your Drawings | 3

The 4 tabs on the side of the Project Navigator let you create, access, and organize the drawings in the current project.

2 If it does not already display, click the Project tab.

The Project tab reports information that has already been added to the project: the project name and number, and the levels and divisions that it contains. Levels are the floors of the building, and divisions are wings or horizontal segments of the building. As you create your design drawings in this tutorial, you will assign them a location on a building level. This Getting Started Project contains 5 levels and, because it does not feature wings, a single default division.

3 Click the Constructs tab.

This tab organizes the drawings that create the geometry of your building. These drawings are classified as constructs or elements.

Constructs are the main building blocks of your design. They define unique portions of the building, and are assigned to a location (level and division) within it.

Although this Getting Started project is unfinished, a few constructs reside in the project: 2 floor slabs, an elevator shaft, and an 05 floor. You will create constructs for floors 1-4 of the building.

In contrast, elements contain collections of geometry that can be used repeatedly in different design drawings, such as a drawing of a service core that would be referenced onto multiple floors of a building. In the AutoCAD Architecture project workflow, elements are referenced into constructs.

In this project, 2 typical restroom elements are provided. You will place these layouts on floors 1-4 of the building by referencing them into each floor construct.

4 Click the Views tab.

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The Views tab organizes view drawings in which constructs and elements are referenced to provide specific views of a building. Views allow you to tell AutoCAD Architecture in architectural terms what types of drawings you want to assemble, such as first floor plans, second floor framing plans, or building sections. Views may contain any number of constructs, which in turn, may reference elements. After you create views, you can organize them on sheets.

No view drawings have been created in the Getting Started project.

5 Click the Sheets tab.

The Sheets tab organizes a set of project drawing sheets that you can plot or electronically publish. Sheet drawings contain paperspace layouts that comprise the sheet layout. You reference model space views from view drawings onto sheets to create sheet views.

If you are familiar with the AutoCAD Sheet Set Manager, the Sheets tab should also look familiar.

Since sheets contain views (which reference constructs) and elements, any changes to the design in the constructs or elements can be easily updated in the views and sheets, by reloading the externally referenced drawings.

Now that you have an overview of how your drawings are organized and managed in AutoCAD Architecture, proceed to the next exercise to start designing.

Managing Your Drawings | 5

Creating Spaces to Calculate Floor Plan Area

In this exercise, you use the automated space planning tools in AutoCAD Architecture to calculate area on a preliminary floor plan. You use the linework in a 2D floor plan sketch created in AutoCAD to quickly generate 2D spaces complete with tags that report each room area. After you create the spaces, you place a room schedule that automatically reads the area information from the space tags, and reports it in the schedule table.

When the schedule is complete, you use the editing grips available on AutoCAD Architecture objects to change the dimensions of a space on the floor plan. You watch how the space tag automatically reports the new room area, and with the click of a button, you update the schedule to include the new area.

1 Open an AutoCAD drawing that contains the 2D floor plan sketch:

■ Click File menu ➤ Open.

■ Navigate to C:\My Documents\Autodesk\My Projects\Getting_Started_I [Getting_Started_M].

■ Select 01 Spaces Layout.dwg, and click Open.

The sketch, complete with delineated rooms for the space plan layout, displays. Although the sketch is located in the project, it is not a project drawing (construct, element, view, or sheet). You must save the sketch drawing to the project as a construct before you create the space plan.

2 Save the sketch to the project as a construct:

■ With 01 Spaces Layout open, on the Project Navigator, click the Constructs tab.

■ Right-click the Constructs folder, and click Save Current Drawing as Construct.

■ On the Add Construct worksheet, click the Name field, and enter 01 Space Plan.

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■ Under Assignments, for Level 1, select Division 1.

This setting assigns the 01 Space Plan to the first floor (level) of the building, in division 1 of the building. By default, each building has a single division. Because this building does not have multiple wings or other horizontal segments, it contains only the single default division.

■ Click OK.

Notice the open drawing has been renamed 01 Space Plan, and displays in the Constructs folder on the Project Navigator.

Next, access a space tool, and set the tool properties so that the spaces you create are 2D and tagged as they are created. The tools in AutoCAD Architecture streamline object creation by allowing you to specify common options before you create the object.

3 On the Getting_Started tool palette that displays on the side of your screen, click the General Space tool.

If the tool is not visible, use the scroll bar on side of the palette to locate it.

4 Specify the Space tool properties:

■ On the Properties palette, under General, for Style, verify that Standard is selected.

■ For Tag, select Aec7_Space_Tag [M_Aec7_Space_Tag].

■ For Create type, select Generate.

■ For Associative, select No.

■ Under Generate Space, for Filter boundary set, select All linework.

■ Under Component Dimensions, for Geometry Type, select 2D.

5 Without clicking inside a room, move the cursor into each room on the plan.

As you move the cursor into a room, the space object automatically detects the linework room boundary. The boundary of the space that you can generate from the room linework displays in red.

6 Click in the large room on the bottom of the plan.

Creating Spaces to Calculate Floor Plan Area | 7

A tagged space is created.

7 Autogenerate the remaining spaces on the plan:

■ Right-click in the drawing, and click Generate all.

Tagged spaces are created in the remaining rooms.

■ Press ESC to end the Space command.

8 Reposition 1 of the tags in the upper-left space:

■ Zoom to the 5 spaces in the upper-left corner of the floor plan.

■ If necessary, on the application status bar, click OSNAP to turn it off, as shown.

■ Select the tag that overlaps the 2 spaces on the lower-left.

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A light blue Location grip displays on the tag.

■ Select and move the Location grip to reposition the tag centrally on the space.

■ Press ESC to hide the grip.

9 If necessary, reposition the tags in the other spaces on the plan.

The space tags on the floor plan report that all the rooms are the same type of space. Next, learn how to use the different space tools to create space objects for other room types on the plan.

10 Redefine the spaces on the plan:

■ On the Getting_Started tool palette, right-click the Corridor tool, and click Apply Tool Properties

to ➤ Space.

■ Select the 4 corridors on the floor plan, as shown.

Creating Spaces to Calculate Floor Plan Area | 9

TIP Make sure you select the space and not the tag.

■ Press ENTER, and press ESC.

The space tag now identifies each selected space as a corridor, and the space displays with a colored fill.

■ Use the other space tools on the Getting_Started tool palette that correspond to the names in the plan

shown below to redefine the remaining spaces on the plan. When you finish, all spaces on the plan will display with colored fills.

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