topic Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct??? in Fusion Design, Validate & Document Forum

Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

Anonymous — Tue, 19 Apr 2016 04:31:23 GMT

Hey all,

got a second chance at work for showing the capabilities of Fusion 360 (after the first presentation where all my drawings were nowhere to be seen), and got some fictive projects to work trough at home to see wheter Fusion can mean something for the company.

I designed a simple part, and need to show both renders and projections for it, so I created a drawing from the design and wanted to add dimensions. To my horror, these are not correct??? Am I doing something wrong here or is this a bug?

Screenshots attached from Model mode and Drawing mode.

Thanks!

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

catot — Tue, 19 Apr 2016 15:02:07 GMT

It's the same here, it seems like dimensions from isometric views are not correct. Dimensioning from one of the normal views however, should give the correct dimensions. (front/back, right/left, top/bottom, or normal to the face/geometry you want to dimension.)

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

krithika.sundararajan — Wed, 20 Apr 2016 02:15:13 GMT

Hi stormychel and catot,

The dimensions in 2D drawings represent the dimensions from a given viewing angle and not the flattened lengths. As an example, I'm attaching a drawing of a 100x100x100mm cube. Note that while the orthographic views (Front, Bottom) show the exact length measurements, the other orientations show the edge lengths from that viewing angle.

Orthographic views too will not match the edge lengths from the modeling environment if the edge being measured does not lie on the XY, YZ or XZ plane. This could be achieved with Auxiliary views (not currently in the drawings module but it is in our roadmap). The workaround for auziliary views is to create custom named views. Here is a post that discusses this: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/design-validate-document/dimensions-for-non-orthogonal-features-in-drawings/m-p/6212059#M48113

Please share if you have any further questions or comments.

Thanks,

Krithika

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

Anonymous — Wed, 20 Apr 2016 04:08:09 GMT

Hi,

is there a reason for this odd behaviour? I don't see myself explaining this to my boss... he would probably ask me why the hell I want to use this software (for which I couldn't blame him in this case).

Measuring the same in the modelling view does give correct results, so I don't think this is a software restriction... Fusion is far too advanced for this!

The way I want to work is give one machine setup sheet (generated by Fusion 360 CAM) and one sheet containing a perspective (orthographic?) view of the part with the finished dimensions on it measured in the drawing module... so if I go along with the current way Fusion works we will have a lot of bad parts... Off course I can take measurements in modelling space and manually adjust the ones in drawing module, but this means that whenever the model changes for some reason, or when we use an existing part to make a derivative new one, the drawing needs to be updated manually again. Since we will be working with multiple seats in the future (with me as CAD-administrator and main designer), I see a lot of bad parts being cut in the workshop because of forgotten adjustments.

Off course I could supply projected views, but this makes the drawings more complicated for people in the workshop. Some are not very skilled in 'reading' drawings and again, this will result in a lot of questions and bad parts...

Regards,

Michel

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

O.Tan — Wed, 20 Apr 2016 05:16:38 GMT

I'm not sure the upcoming Drawings update will fix issues like these but my general word of advice right now, Fusion is good enough in all aspects (CAD, CAM, CAE) EXCEPT drawings. So if you still have licence for a traditional CAD or Autocad, keep it for now so you can do your dimensioning there.

Right now if you want to Dimension Isometric views, this is the error you'll get. The angular dimension is use for a different purpose, and you can technically get it to dimension but it'll give you the wrong value as mentioned above.

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

Anonymous — Wed, 20 Apr 2016 15:55:32 GMT

Seems they should disable all dimensioning for now to be sure no wrong measurements can be made...

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

scott.price — Thu, 21 Apr 2016 02:31:10 GMT

Hi @Anonymous -

Thanks for the post.

As Krithika mentioned above, what's happening here is that the view is being converted to 2D geometry and the dimension is being placed reflecting the 2D distance between the two points.

This is a traditional 2D documentation approach, partially because of clarity for someone unfamiliar with the part design - if a dimension in a drawing always reflects the 2D distance between two points, then there is a consistency in expectation between all dimensions in a drawing.

That being said, there have been a few requests around 3D dimensions in drawings and while it is not on the near term roadmap - we'll keep everyone updated on whether or not there will be more support added to this area.

Best,

Scott

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

Anonymous — Thu, 21 Apr 2016 04:13:46 GMT

Hi,

wouldn't it be safer to completely disable dimensioning on lines that are not normal views then, including angular dimensions? I can see this being a problem for someone with a critical view on things when comparing CAD-solutions...

In my opinion, Fusion is the best thing currently on the market (Onshape is a joke btw) but these small quirks should be ironed out to make the product look more stable and professional...

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

scott.price — Thu, 21 Apr 2016 17:10:48 GMT

It's a really good point - and it is something we have been and are considering. One issue with blocking it is just limiting flexibility of the product - Our current approach is to block it with the "Smart" dimensioning tool, but still allow it with the more exclusive dimensioning tool set in the event someone needs to create this dimension for some case we haven't anticipated.

There are a lot of options here - and your post really is appreciated as it helps us understand a little more about expectation and work towards improving the product experience. Please keep any ideas you have or issues you find coming -

Best,

Scott

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

JesseLH — Sun, 08 Jan 2017 22:23:49 GMT

This really must change. It's crazy that I either can't draw a dimension on an isometric view or if I do it doesn't represent the expected dimension.

Look at the drawing in my screenshot... It's so confusing.

Is there a feature request for this change that I can show my support for?

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

7milesup — Mon, 09 Jan 2017 00:34:48 GMT

I was in the process of trying to solve a completely unrelated problem but decided to read this post. I too, am on board for this change in Fusion 360. I am a very new user to 360, and at times, I was very frustrated by some dimensions, thinking that I had messed up. Now I know, it's not me (at least not this problem. LOL)

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

cmiller66 — Mon, 09 Jan 2017 17:58:10 GMT

Hi JesseLH and n325cc,

You're correct, currently for the single dimension tool we block dimension creation to isometric views, and if you use the individual linear/aligned dimension tools you'll get the 2D projection of that distance (at that scale), not the actual 3D model length. This is a current limitation - dimensions must be placed to the Ortho views in the drawing.

We have an IdeaStation where you can up-vote feature enhancements. The closest two I could find are:

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/ideastation-request-a-feature-or/3d-dimensions-in-isometric-drawings/idi-p/6690488

and

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/ideastation-request-a-feature-or/dimensions/idi-p/5843520

In the meantime I will also forward the request to the team. We have a long roadmap of "To Do" features which we are working on, for example multi-sheet support which is in development now. These feature requests get stack ranked by priority and user requests do affect this ranking.

Thanks,
Chris

Re: Dimensions in DRAWING mode not correct???

JesseLH — Tue, 10 Jan 2017 19:21:47 GMT

Thanks for the response. Given that the other ideas have been closed for lack of support, please upvote this idea here:

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/ideastation-request-a-feature-or/3d-dimensions-in-isometric-drawings/idc-p/6796326#M21503s