Printing templates

Hi All

Fairly new to Libre cad so any advice very much appreciated.

So... I have a drawing completed. Perhaps foolishly I put all the elevations, sections and plans for an industrial project in the same work space. Now I just want to print certain elements to separate PDF's. How do I select which elements I want to appear in print preview or do I have to copy each separately to a new drawing (and risk missing revisions on other elements) or am I just missing something obvious here?

Second question, I'd like to use architectural templates in the print space. Can these be downloaded somewhere for various paper sizes or do I have to create my own? Connected to the first question, do I then have to create separate drawings for each different template or can I toggle through various one in drawing preferences.

Thanks in advance to all of you with far more knowledge than I and I hope the questions even make sense.

Cheers

Hi Sam,

I create addional layers for my 'print spaces' (I call it a "PageSpace"), one for each page/view.  Each PageSpace layer contains a page border (or page template) proportional to the paper size to create a 'window' around the detail / elevation / etc. I want on a separate page.  By turning off all layers except the current PageSpace and then with Print Preview, establish the position, scale, etc.  Turn on the layers to be printed in that view and then (without changing scale or anything else) print the view.  If the page margins are setup  and match the page border you can get a clean print, otherwise you can end up with artifacts in the margins.  So in one drawing I could have:
   [PageSpace - Elevations] with a scale on 1/32 on Tabloid
   [PageSpace - X-section] with a scale of 1/8 on Letter
   ...

I ended up creating my own drawing template with title blocks, one for each paper size I use.

Gary

Thanks very much Gary.

If I understand, you draw out your page surrounds full scall to the dimensions of your intended print sheet say 210x320 or whatever A4 actually is. But what stops that scaling also when I alter the scale to fit my drawing to the page. Sorry again but I really am a newbie.

Regards

Sam

Hi Sam,

This is a admittedly a cludge and a bit of a chicken and egg thing when determining scale...  

As an example, say you want to print a 'detail' on A4 from the complete drawing scaled to fit on A1:

1. Setup the drawing with paper size that you want to print the detail on; A4.
2. Switch to Print Preview and adjust the scale (Toolbar / upper left) so the detail you want to print fits the page.  Note the scale.  (Hint: Use the 'Tab mode' to switch back and forth between the drawing window and the print preview window.)
3. Switch back to the drawing window and on a new layer, called for example [PageSpace-Detail1], draw the page border, porportional to the paper size, to the inverse of the scale as determined by step 2 (or insert your page border block from the Library Browser that you create previously  scaled accordingly).  If you determined the scale to be 1:10, scale the page border by a factor of 10.
4. Switch back to the Print Preview to fine tune the location of the page border (The page can be dragged around relative to the drawing/detail) or turn off all layers except [PageSpace-Detail1] and click the 'Centre to page' button. Still in the Print Preview, turn the layers making up the detail to be print back on. The Print Preview window is 'live' and will be updated accordingly.

When you want to print the entire drawing back on A1 paper, turn on the respective page space layer, i.e. [PageSpace-All], turn off [PageSpace-Detail1] and adjust the scale as needed/previously determined.

It is a bit of a pain to setup, but once it is setup it is easy enough to switch back and forth.  Certainly using blocks for the page border / title block makes it a bit easier...

Gary

PS: I draw on ANSI sizes and my page border blocks accomodates a 1/2" margin.  So my page border for an ANSI A / Letter (8 1/2 x 11) is 10 x 7 1/2 (landscape).  If I'm working with a 1/4 scale I'd factor it up by 4 when inserting it as a block resulting in a rectangle for the border 40 x 30.

Cheers Gary

Much appreciated.

Away to make a start on building up a library of these.

All the best.

Worked a treat.

Thanks for passing on the knowledge.