Hiding Things Behind Sketched Symbols

[Anonymous]

Hello. I was wondering if I could hide objects "behind" sketched symbols. I also want to be able to dimension to it, if possible. Since it is a symbol, it isn't recognized as geometry I can dimension to. I know I can turn off the visibility of the lines I need to, but not the ones that extend past the symbol. I hope this makes sense. Thanks.

[MechMachineMan]

Are you just trying to layout material over a grid or what are you trying to accomplish?

[Anonymous]

No. The grid is just a measurement grid. The symbol that says 10 AMPS is the problem. I dont want to see my objects behind it. But I dont want to turn off the whole object, just whats behind the symbol. If you are familiar with AutoCAD, I basically want to make that symbol a "block".

[salariua · Accepted solution]

Welcome to the forum,

At first I thought you are looking for text mask which is not possible in Inventor and for which we only have the option "Cross Hatch Clipping" which will cut hatches with rectangular box around the text.

What you need is to add filling/hatching to your symbol and fill it with white color. (don't think it will look good on autocad exports, maybe you will use a different color).

Here's how:

Unfortunately drawing dimensions will always be on top; good or bad is for you to decide (and check pdf, autocad, exports because layers don't always export like in Inventor; the what's on top and what's underneath and you might end up with weird results).

[admaiora]

In these cases i do exactly as Adrian has explained.

[Anonymous]

Awesome. Thank you so much.

[salariua · Accepted solution]

I have managed to look into this some more and wanted to update this post.

This method is not perfect and there’s missing functionality here but once you used the fill command to put a mask in the symbol you can also edit the Symbol (not Edit Definition) and choose Symbol Clipping. This will remove extension lines behind the symbol like from dimensions and other leader texts.

Although it’s slightly better, still not perfect because centrelines and other cosmetic entities (drawing items) will show on top. We do need a Send to Back, Bring to Front, Bring on Top and Text Mask like in AutoCAD. I would still check the export to dxf and pdf to see what the results are in terms of top layer priority.

[salariua]

And unfortunatelly in 2016 it's been broken. Filling a region with colour will not hide objects behind them.

[whamlin]

@salariua @JDMather 

Thanks for the tips guys. I got this "Hatch" to work for regular geometry lines.

It didn't work for the dimensions lines. I made a sketch with lines constrained from my geometry and reattached the dimensions to the top. It's kind of extreme, but the fourth or fifth person to review my drawing suggested making the text easier to read. I wanted to see if I could do it.

[Hunteil]

Another example of hatch masking but it's a little older: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-forum/is-there-a-text-mask-option-in-a-drawing/td-p/6257852

Another link showing hatch masking (nothing extra just example): http://blog.ads-sol.com/2015/10/text-mask.html

I'd recommend a mixture of the solution for this thread above: (Right Click symbol / block > Edit Symbol > Check box Symbol Clipping.) And using it with the hatch masking like others mentioned as needed.

Downside to the hatch masking is that AutoCAD exports don't look good and the shop will complain that they can't see the text you're masking.

Please vote on the Idea forums to help increase awareness to help improve this process: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/dimension-background-mask/idi-p/6813011#comments