Little help with translation

[J. Miller]

I have a DWG file that came from The Dead Sea Marriott Resort and Spa.

For the life of me i cannot get the import scale correct.

the scale of the drawing says 1/100

Can anyone help me out here

I have an image of a few doors with dimensions if that helps. The DWG is also attached.

If you could let met know what import conversion you did that would be great as I have another file from the same group

 

LEVEL3-BLOCKA.dwg

[zoomer]

I tried to open the File in Bricscad.

 

I see that the author did not choose any units.

(I would not have expected this happen in reality)

It is Autocad Units - so could be anything.

 

But the rest is set to general imperial.

 

So it may need to manually choose and try Inch or Feet in

Import Dialog. Or manual Scaling after import.

I would try factors of 2,54 or 1/2,54 plus decimal scaling.

 

Generally it seems to break my Bricscad(s) after a few minutes.

Could be a strange File or just a M1 or Montery PB problem here.

[michaelk]

I opened it in a dwg reader and I think what's going on is the drawing is drawn on a 1:1 space, but whoever drew it did the math and converted everything down by a factor of 100.  A quick look at the dimension objects shows that they are really just lines and text.  And, like @zoomer, I don't see a unit recorded with the dwg file.

 

I was able to specify millimeters as the units during import and scale everything symmetrically by object using a "dimension object" and it seems to work.  I'll attach a v 2016 file here.

 

 

Weird Scale v2016.vwx

[J. Miller]

so this was the scale translation after trail and error.

at least the door dimension  = the fake dimensions on the drawing

Got me??

[zoomer]

1 hour ago, michaelk said:

I was able to specify millimeters as the units during import and scale everything symmetrically by object using a "dimension object" and it seems to work.  I'll attach a v 2016 file here.

 

 

Hmmh,

Millimeter was not OK for me.

So I tried Meters and it somehow works for me when importing to VW.

 

But :

- the drawing doesn't look very precise

- it is kind of geolocated or world coordinate based, so far from VW origin

- there are at least 2 Dimensions, as Symbols, far from the drawing

 

I think, hence the problems in Bricscad on M1.

[Jeff Prince]

This is pretty typical when working with drawings from the Middle East.  You received a drawing that was exported as sized for paper, in metric units.  I don’t know why, but most of the contractors in Egypt and Persian Gulf Countries prefer to export sheets instead of “model” type drawings.

 

To adapt this to your Vectorworks Design Layer: 

Vectorworks - set units to CM (customary architectural units in the Middle East) 

Import DWG - set import units to CM (the stated units in the titleblock)

***If you set Import DWG to units to M instead of CM, it comes in without having to scale it.

CMD A to select all, Scale by 100 (the stated scale of the drawing in the titelblock).

You now have a Vectorworks file that is 1:1 using metric units.

If you prefer Imperial units, simply change your units after the above steps have been taken.

Move the titelblock to a Sheet Layer, cut some viewports, and you are back to the happy place.

 

@zoomer is right, there are a few funky symbols imported, you can fix that by entering the symbol and deleting the pieces that are floating well below the drawing area.  They appear to be dimension ticks related to water features.  This is pretty typical too.

 

No arbitrary scaling required once you have had to deal with this workflow a few times 🙂

 

 

Edited August 17, 2021 by jeff prince

[LarryO]

1cm : 1M [1000mm]

1cm : 100cm

 

90cm = 900mm (=35.43")

2.54cm = 1"

8'-4" = 100"

 

Eliminate the eccentric imperial systems of quarters, rods, inches, chains, yards, furlongs, eighths and smelly feet and it is easy to visualize.

[Peter Neufeld.]

Hello,

I always use https://viewer.autodesk.com which is the free dwg viewer from Autodesk. You just have to create a free account. It's easy to use but an important checker. When someone says it must be Vectorworks fault at not translating the file properly have a look in the viewer to double check and see what you've been given. Importantly you can measure objects as a reference. See the blue viewer dimension next to the 'dimension' on the plan (and it is the 2D model not paper space). It's also good to check critical files when exporting to dwg.

 

In the dwg Import dialogue (as already described) there are no units specified but it is drawn in 'Decimetres'. I always go to 'Advanced' and then 'Conversion' in order to check the likely scale on the page. Something like this at 1:2000 is probably about right and once imported measures correctly. When you see weird numbers in the 'Fit to Page' area you know the units are incorrect. It is much better getting the scale right on import than having to rescale the drawing afterwards. If not right then try again. BTW every once in a while in Australia I see dwg's drawn in Decimetres and this was my first guess.

 

Hope this helps.

Cheers,

Peter