coordinating with Autocad

[katebjohnson]

I am working with a computer drafting firm, which uses Autocad for the production of my construction docs and am designing in 3D with Vectorworks. I export in DWG format one layer (2D) and am relatively careful about my class assignments. (classes get converted to layers) We are having problems with my files hanging them up, something to do with properties. I am not an Autocad user. Sometime selecting object can take them alot of time. We have tried changing fonts. That seemed to help a little. The most recent file was 1 MB, so it wasn't that large. Does any one have any tips or techniques that I should be using?

[Jim Smith]

Kate, I have noted that some 3-D objects and some fills are a problem moving from one programme to another. What version of VW are you using? (VW 10 seems to have fewer "hang-ups" than VW9)

If you are working in VW 10 you might try this as a work-around: Make duplicates of your file & title the duplicates them with the name of the "finished" drawing you would like to have (Main Floor Plan or South Elevation for example). Open each file and use the kind of rendering you would like to have used in the AutoCad document, ?hidden line render? for example. Next, select all and choose convert to lines from the tool menu.Save this file and export to AutoCad. Repeat as required. A bit of a pain I know but I have used this with some success with VW8.5.

[katebjohnson]

Jim, That sounds like a good idea. Part of my prep to export to Autocad is to move everything onto one layer, similar to Autocad's model space. At that point selecting all and converting to lines would be quite simple. (I'm using 10.5.0.)

The whole idea of taking these great 3D drawings and converting them to 2D to explain to a builder how to build a 3D structure seems convoluted. I guess progress isn't always linear.

Thanks Kate

[Marietta]

This is a bit late, but I have found that sometimes polylines do not convert well into Autcocad while polgons do. You can try to convert polylines to polygons and see if that helps. Sometimes when doing this, the new polygons split inot two or three instead of 1 polyline. It is worth a try if you have curves that you do not want to change to lines.