line color of wall shows blue

[ceapple]

When adding a new wall to a 2-d view in Architecture the lines of the wall are blue NOT green. This has happened after several walls are already in place and showing as the correct layer. Units for paper and model space are set correctly and no settings were changed from inserting the correct wall to the blue wall. Justification is left and moving clockwise. 

[David_W_Koch · Accepted solution]

If you draw a line (on any layer, but preferrably one that does not have a blue color assigned), is the line the same blue as your errant Walls?  If so, you may have changed the default color setting from ByLayer to Blue (or a color number that is "blue").  With the Properties Palette open and the Design tab current, with no object selected, is the Color property (at the very top, under the General category) set to ByLayer?  If not, change it to ByLayer.  Does that fix your Wall color problem?

If the problem remains in that file, if you start a new file, does the problem occur there as well, or is the color of any Walls that are drawn as expected?

If the problem remains, can you reply and attach a sample file that demonstrates the issue?

[ceapple]

Thank you! My students have not had this issue pop up in a while. But when it did if they were to open up a new file and start again the issue fixed itself. I will keep these solutions in mind if it comes up again. Thank you again!

[David_W_Koch]

The default color, etc. is stored in each drawing file.  If they start new drawings from a properly set up template file, then the defaults should be set to ByLayer (in my opinion, anyway).

One common way for these to get changed is if the user is planning to use the Properties palette to change the properties of a particular object, but either does not select the object first, or the selection gets "lost", and the change is then made on the Properties palette with no object selected, which changes the drawing default value.

[PDamodara]

Hi,

Im having the same problem as the User defined it in the beginning of this discussion. I have been making plans of various blocks on a site and have been using INSERT to add the layers from a previous drawing so that all the properties and layers are consistent. On the 5th drawing, after most of the walls are drawn in default green and I used Match properties to change the color (red) to the Layer I created for walls, one wall displays blue and it does not allow the color to be changed. The same thing happened for a new drawing, where the layers were added from a previous drawing. Ive also tried opening another new drawing and creating all the layers defining properties for each of them, but the same blue walls appear. Lines or other 2d shapes in the same layer are coming out in red. Have also checked the properties tab and everything displays 'Bylayer'. Please help!

[David_W_Koch]

Welcome to the community!

I am going to assume that when you were using Match Properties on the Walls, you were just changing the Walls from one layer (which had a green color) to your Wall layer (which has a red color), and not changing the color of the Wall itself.

There could be a number of reasons why your blue Wall remains blue.  The Wall itself could have had its color property set to blue, rather than ByLayer.  Many (most/all?) AEC objects to not display a Color property on the Properties palette, to make it harder to change that property accidentally (other than setting the drawing default to something other than ByLayer); unfortunately, that makes it harder to see what is assigned and change it back to ByLayer.  To do that:

• Select the Wall and right click.
• On the context menu, select Edit Object Display.
• In the Object Display dialog, choose the General Properties tab.  (If you select multiple items, this will be the only tab.)
• To the right of the Color button, the effective color will be displayed in a swatch, and the color name/number will be listed.  If this is not set to ByLayer, use the Color button to set it to ByLayer.
• Select OK twice to return to the drawing.

Your Wall may now be displaying in the color of the layer, provided that the visible component(s) are set to display ByBlock.  If the Wall is still blue, then it may be doing so based on the Display System settings.  These could be either set directly in the active Display Representation for Walls or as part of a Material Definition.  If you can reply back and attach a sample file with your blue Wall, it will be easier to sort out exactly why the Wall is blue.