new user

[georgehobel]

hey folks... Im a new user of AutoCAD... right now Im working with AutoCAD2002.  I have figured out how to draw house plans, and learning more and more, but I was wondering how to go from drawing my plans to drawing elevations.... That task is not in the tutorial, and I havent figured it out on my own yet....????

[pendean]

An elevation is nothing more difficult than a plan: you are just drawing what is on the face of the wall instead of what is on the face of the floor. Just like you draw on paper.

Unless you are new to drafting in general it's not a difficult concept to grasp: are you trying by change to over think it with some sort of 3D thing? that's not needed.

[georgehobel]

I've been drafting and designing for years...Only new to CAD.

I've drawn a floor plan using CAD, now trying to figure out the next step...

[Kent1Cooper · Accepted solution]

Assuming most elements of the plan are orthogonal, you can turn ORTHO on, draw parallel Lines or Rays perpendicularly from relevant points outward from the edges of the plan, and use them as projection for the horizontal position of things in the elevations.  Draw floor-plane and/or ground-plane lines far enough outboard from the plan, as a basis to measure the heights of things from.  The elevation off the bottom side of the plan will be upright, the one off the top side upside-down, and those off the sides turned 90 degrees, so you will need to rotate things once you get the basics established.  You could instead do each side as the bottom edge, and rotate the plan appropriately for drawing each.  If you have an outside wall that's angled, and want an elevation looking straight at it in a non-orthogonal direction, that would be the easier approach, although you could also change the angle that ORTHO works at, using the SNAPANG System Variable and aligning it with the angled face.  As Dean said, this is all pretty much the same approach you would take with manual drafting.

[georgehobel]

Ok....this is all great help...thank you. I think I'm begining to get an
understanding of how this works...and that sounds very much like completing
a pencil drawing. I'm guessing then that you could clip the lines that
join the different views, then cut and paste the separate views into a
layout.
Maybe my expectations of how this might work were inaccurate. At this
point, I'm wondering how to to link the views so I can display the 3d
model....so much to learn..

[Kent1Cooper · Accepted solution]

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@georgehobel wrote:
....
Maybe my expectations of how this might work were inaccurate. At this point, I'm wondering how to to link the views so I can display the 3d model....so much to learn..

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If you want them to be inter-related like that, and not be just the electronic equivalent of paper drawings, you should construct it as a 3D model, and then you can set up views to "look at" that model from any direction to get elevations [and even the plan view].  You can generate the 3D model out of the plan you already have, but don't "draft" the elevations.  Revit and the Architectural add-ons to AutoCAD exist to make that easier, but it is possible [though more work] to do it in basic AutoCAD -- look into User Coordinate Systems, 3Dface for surface planes, and/or the various 3D Solid commands [Extrude, Slice, Union, Subtract, etc.].  It may not be very easy for a beginner, but it is doable.

[georgehobel · Accepted solution]

Ok..that sounds like enough to get me headed in the right
direction....thanks for the help. I'll post back to let you know how it
works out...

[georgehobel]

Got it..... It really is super simple.... Was able to sit down and design for six hours yesterday...outside under an umbrella at a local restaurant instead of being coupled up at my drafting table.... Now I need a larger laptop screen...