Foreshortened linear dimension?

Anyone know of a good way to create a foreshortened linear dimension?
I realize that this can be done for diameters and radius but I cannot
find a good way for linear dimensions. What about adding a second arrow
head to the end of a dimension so that there are two arrow heads at one
dimension termination point? Both arrow heads pointing in the same
direction of course...

I also tried hiding either the first or second extension lines but
that also does not work in this particular instance.


Sam

 

You pretty much got it right, something that will not fit on the
drawing sheet and needs to be broken up. Are you familiar with "match
lines"? More of an civil or plant design drafting technique than
mechanical. I am detailing a set of drawings of a building (actually a
parking deck) and it is over 600' long so I need to break it up with
match lines (I am using cropped views to break it up into two managable
view sizes, one for the East end and one for the West end) but I still
need a single dimension that represents the entire overall length even
though for any given view that dimension will not actually be true to
the objects being displayed in the drawing view. For example if the
drawing view shows 300' of the building I still need to have a
dimension showing 600' overall length in that view. I have figured out
that I can create a single dimension that shows the entire length of
the building (600') then create another dimension for the portion I am
trying to show in one of the views (300'), delete the <Dim> for the
300' dimension place a regular note, group it to the 300' dimension and
link that note to the 600' dimension. Then I hide the original 600'
dimension. That way I am showing the overall length and it is still
parametric to the model so that if the building gets bigger or smaller
my "dimension" will update. I am sure all that is very confusing to
read. The last remaining problem is that I want to show a double arrow
head to represent the fact that this dimension is forshortened.

Guess I could just fake it and sketch in another arrow head but I was
hoping for something better.

Maybe create a block with double arrow heads and place that at the end
of the dimension?

Sam

 

I started to comment on using broken views in my first response, that
comes close to working but now quite and of course does not do anything
for the arrow head problem. Using broken views I have to insert two
sets of breaks per each view because the area I am removing a little
bit from both ends of the view and keeping the middle, which works fine
but also removes some sketch entities that I have sketched (and
dimensioned too) in the drawing view that I need. Using broken views
comes close but still not quite right.

thanks for the effort...

 

Sam,

If I understand you - for example, if you have a 5 inch long part with a
small feature on the end, and want an overall dim from one end to a point on
the feature that would normally get lost because it's so small and you can't
use a broken view. I have worked around something like this by creating a
detail view of the feature, and importing the dim from the model into the
detail. Now, the detail is at a scale that this reference dim's other end
goes halfway across the drawing, right? (This is why you would want a
foreshortened linear dim) The workaround I use is to edit the property of
the dim I want to foreshorten, click "display" and uncheck the "display
first" (or second) extension and dimension lines. This will in effect hide
the half of your dimension hanging out of the detail view. Then drag the
dim text over to the location you want in the detail view and insert a
zig-zag block next to the dim text. (Oh yea, forgot to say I created a
zig-zag block that has the "broken" or zig-zag lines normally found in a
foreshortened dimension line). It all sounds a lot longer than it takes,
but is kind of easy if you just need to show part of a dim in a detail view.
If it's not what your looking to do, at least maybe it'll give you an idea
for your application. And of course, as always if someone has a simpler way
to do what I described above, please let me know - Always willing to learn a
potential simple or easier way of something I could be missing!!

Scott

 

Whoops - Should have read your post better - sorry!

Scott