Power Dimensioning

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AutoCAD Mechanical makes it easy to place dimensions into the drawing with less effort.

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It can also add intelligence to leaders being able to extract information from an object that's been selected.

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We can easily edit the content and arrangement of dimensions, and add special drafting symbols and callouts to the drawing.

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We'll begin by using the Power Dimension tool to place a dimension on the drawing.

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Then, using the Baseline option, selecting objects in the view in any order.

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You'll notice the Power Dimensioning tool places dimensions with proper spacing and in the proper order, regardless of which ones were selected first.

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Another great display of the intelligence of Power Dimensioning is to select the ends have circular faces projected on their side,

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and have the Power Dimension understand that these are diameter dimensions.

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Making changes to the Power Dimensions is also extremely easy.

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We can easily select all the dimensions and directly from the toolbar, change their precision level.

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Selecting individual dimensions also brings up a Power Dimensioning toolbar,

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where we can insert tolerances and set their values including the precision of the tolerance themselves.

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Plus it gives us options for assigning fits in making any other changes directly from one single dialog box making it much easier.

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Using the Select Objects option in Power Dimension makes it simple to pick a piece of geometry,

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and AutoCAD Mechanical will understand if this new dimension needs to be a linear dimension,

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a radius or a diameter based on the type of geometry that's selected.

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Starting a leader note, you can select an object and it will detect that it's not just a circle,

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but that it's a hole with a specific diameter and a specific depth, or in this case, a through hole.

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If the diameter of that hole should change because the fastener that needs to pass through it changes size, the note will change as well.

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You can easily edit the Power Dimensions as well.

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In this case, I'll split the dimension based on a point.

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So this gives me an extra dimension that I no longer need.

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So I can select it, remove it from the dimension set, and then use the Arrange tool to quickly update the spacing for the dimensions.

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In a case like this where there are overlapping dimensions,

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I can select the extension line to break and have it automatically broken where it crosses the dimension line.

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Now I want to add a surface texture callout to the machine face on this casting.

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Select the edge itself and place the symbol directly on the face or place it on a leader.

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You'll see that all of the options that might be used for a surface texture callout are available in the dialog.

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In this case, I'll just callout a texture value.

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For something more specialized, I want to return back to the Assembly drawing.

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It can also just be drafting information that's placed in the drawing view.

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For example, I'll add a fillet, callout, rephrase, I'll add a fillet symbol, put in the size of the fillet and place this symbol onto the drawing.

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Setting the orientation by simply dragging around.

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I'll place another on the other side.

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And then to complete the process in the drawing, I'll place a symbol on the front view as well.

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And to complete the weld callout, we'll add a welding symbol,

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where once again, you'll see the many options for welding symbols are available to you through the dialog.

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This extra level of capability built into AutoCAD Mechanical makes detailing your designs much easier.