Custom alignment direction for Aligned Dimensions

[brendan.henderson]

I added this post to the Inventor forum hoping I was missing something. It appears I'm not.

There needs to be better controls to place aligned dimensions. I mentioned in the original post that a UCS change (like in Autocad) could do it but I now feel that Inventor should just have a RMB option to select an edge to align the dimension to.

[r_lehmann79]

Hello lester

nice idea!

@ Autodesk guys: please bring this option. It's needed so many times for drawing sheet metal parts! You alway have to create a sketch in the view with help geometry to get this dimensions - very copious!

Currently the same idea was posted  by poeschmann:

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideastation/inventor-zeichnung-bemassungsantragung-parallel-z...

Regards Ralf

[DRoam]

I personally think @jletcher's solution is satisfactory. As he said, it follows the expectations of drafting rules and standards. It should also work in any case you can come up with. If there's not a line which you can use to align the center mark, then there's not a line to manually align your dimension to as the OP has requeted, either.

Also, once the dimension has been made as desired, the center mark can be re-aligned back to normal (i.e. square with the page) if desired, and the dimension will keep its alignment.

[brendan.henderson]

Here is another example where better Aligned Dims could be used. No ability to add centre marks or use sketch dims here as these are all Frame Members.

[DRoam]

Good example, @brendan.henderson, thanks for that! That's definitely a situation where it would make sense to orient the dimensions like you've shown, and the only way to do so now would be with the cumbersome Sketch workaround.

[brendan.henderson]

I managed to do it with a chain dimension set. Valid but very cumbersome getting it to align correctly. Still think an Align option would be better.

[dan_szymanski]

Accepted idea [693]. Thanks!

[markus.roth]

i would like to RMB click a dimension in the drawing AND in sketches,  and align it to any edge, line, geometry or whatever i want.

i know that this idea was submitted already in 2015 but as far as i can see it has not been implemented!

this is really important, especially for all working with sheet metal!

[sth]

Hi All,
this is another simple feature we miss so often . Competitor systems which may not deliver so nice Cloud and Mobile toys have this "on board" since decades.
Here's a sample how this works in PTC PRO/ENGINEER 2001 (released around the year 2000 (!!!!!!) )

The workflow in PRO/E is very simple (although it is a version having this terrible menu manager )
Select the 2 points and select "Parallel" from the menu. After this select an edge the dimension should be parallel to.
Then place the dimension.

Result - we need 4 clicks for it - no efforts for any bothering workaround needed.

Our Designers would appreciate having this Feature in Inventor instead of more useless toys.

But I fear it's neither amazing nor awsome for marketing 

Cheers,

Thomas

[sguan1212]

I wonder how many votes is required to get this through the door

[sguan1212]

Surely that's enough votes, how many do we need to push this through

[74321Admin]

I´d like to make dimensions parallel to the object.

See the first picture: This is how it should be. It´s easy in AutoCAD just by aligning a user-coordinate-system to the object and then start dimensioning.

See the second picture: This is the actual state in Inventor. I have to make construction lines in sketches to create snap points for a parallel dimension.

Please provide the opportunity for a parallel dimension without sketches or other workarounds !

[DRoam]

Hi @74321Admin, your request is actually identical to one of the top ideas in the system right now: Custom alignment direction for Aligned Dimensions. It currently has 395 votes and has been accepted by the Inventor team.

Feel free to add your vote to that idea, and subscribe to it to be notified when it's implemented (you can subscribe by commenting or by clicking Options --> Subscribe at the top left of the post -- unfortunately, voting on an idea does not subscribe you to receive updates regarding it). 

[dan_szymanski]

This idea has been implemented within Autodesk Inventor 2021. Before placement, a linear dimension can be aligned to a desired angle by right clicking and changing the dimension type to "Rotated" and subsequently selecting the desired geometry to rotate the dimension to. Special thanks to everyone who cast a vote for it.

[TIM8URH5]

8 years later .......has this been fixed yet?

[TIM8URH5]

OK.... I still use 2020, I'll  look forward to when we get next version just for this fix

[ReneRepina]

Greetings.

That is a great feature, thank you!

Best regards,

Rene Repina