andyaz Posted May 12 Share Posted May 12 Hi there, I am a carpenter/contractor, I have a Premier X16 and have been learning how to draft my own plans with it. I have a lot of experience building stuff and have read many plans from others but am a true beginner to drafting and CAD. Have been enjoying learning and already was able to submit some basic small plans for a few small projects- very satisfying. I am trying to make details in CA, but struggling pretty hard and haven't been able to find resources when searching. A lot of my jobs involve strange/unusual details- for example, pouring stem walls for non-load bearing walls on top of existing slabs, and joining an old slab with a new slab with rebar dowels. among many others. so far I have been getting by using other people's details, I "snip" them from PDFs of plans that have been sent to me by local architects and draftsman. I am trying to figure out how to draw this to scale in Chief. I have stumbled on this "template" in the CAD management- how does one use this to draw out the detail? I just can't seem to find any example video on how to get this done. Thank you for any help. I am open to investing in training if you have good suggestions. edit: attached screenshot- this is the "template" I found. How do I use this? Do you draw lines, and if so how to scale them? Does this mean that to draw a 6" slab, per se, I need to draw it to the scale of 1/2" on this detail? The program doesn't seem to allow me to draw a line that small and the text would seem huge if I did. And how does one fill that box in with the template shading/pattern? Am I supposed to draw the details on this template then somehow export them and reuse the template? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glennw Posted May 12 Share Posted May 12 Start by going to Cad>Cad Detail Management>New. You can then use the cad tools to draw your details. Note that you would normally draw the cad details full size and then scale them when sending to layout. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyaz Posted May 13 Author Share Posted May 13 17 minutes ago, glennw said: Start by going to Cad>Cad Detail Management>New. You can then use the cad tools to draw your details. Note that you would normally draw the cad details full size and then scale them when sending to layout. Thanks. Is the “template “ not as useful as it seems then? And does that generally mean not to bother getting it scale when drawing the detail to start with? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gawdzira Posted May 13 Share Posted May 13 By the term "template" do you mean "legend", as in, this is a chart of different graphic symbols? Those are all just polylines with different fill patterns. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyaz Posted May 13 Author Share Posted May 13 7 minutes ago, Gawdzira said: By the term "template" do you mean "legend", as in, this is a chart of different graphic symbols? Those are all just polylines with different fill patterns. Its one of the options when you go to make a new cad detail- called “1” template” or something like that. I posted a screenshot on my first post of what it looks like. Sorry I am bad at communicating about this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyaz Posted May 13 Author Share Posted May 13 An update, I made some progress! I think it is getting there. Having some trouble doing line break/trimming the slab to the break line in this- tried selecting the breakline as the fence and trimming the polyline slab rectangle but no dice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrisb222 Posted Tuesday at 02:46 PM Share Posted Tuesday at 02:46 PM 12 hours ago, andyaz said: Having some trouble doing line break/trimming the slab to the break line in this- tried selecting the breakline as the fence and trimming the polyline slab rectangle but no dice. In 2D CAD Detail, you can use your break line as the end of the "slab" ploy line, then extend lines out. On a Plan View or when working with Objects, I copy/paste the break line, then add lines to create a closed poly line I can then fill white, and turn off the line, so it covers the part I want hidden. Then "bring to front" the original line so it's not also partially hidden. If I'm going to use it again, I block it and save to my library Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gawdzira Posted Tuesday at 02:46 PM Share Posted Tuesday at 02:46 PM You will save your sanity by paying either Chief or one of the others who advertise on this forum for 2 or 3 hours of individualized training. Possibly only one hour to get you up and running on the critical path for your CAD detail drafting. I am not sure what type of object your "slab" is in that image. If you are drawing 2d details, that object would want to be a polyline with fill. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyaz Posted Wednesday at 06:43 PM Author Share Posted Wednesday at 06:43 PM On 5/13/2025 at 7:46 AM, Gawdzira said: You will save your sanity by paying either Chief or one of the others who advertise on this forum for 2 or 3 hours of individualized training. Possibly only one hour to get you up and running on the critical path for your CAD detail drafting. I am not sure what type of object your "slab" is in that image. If you are drawing 2d details, that object would want to be a polyline with fill. yeah you're 1000% right. I hired a guy for some lessons, looking forward to it. I imagine a lot of it is just getting some familiarity with how these CAD programs think and how to make it work for me. Appreciate you all humoring me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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