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I managed to create views in the Draft workbench and added the Drawing Dimensioning utility and can get it to do linear dimensions just fine. Radius dimensions are kicking my butt. No matter what I do I can't figure out how to get it to align to the correct stop point. I zoomed in and it appears to be a difference in rendering/plotting between the drawing and the dimension tool.
I read that there are other ways to add dimension markings using the regular Draft Workbench, Is that the better method?

RobZ_inT wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 5:21 am I read that there are other ways to add dimension markings using the regular Draft Workbench, Is that the better method?

The better method would be to use TechDraw. It is not yet in every aspect as far as Drawing Dimensioning, but is far better than the old duo in many others. Neither Drawing nor Drawing Dimensioning is currently developed any further. TechDraw seems to be under pretty fast development though.

Thanks! I discovered it was already included in the current release version. Unfortunately I can't find any instructions on how to use it....and my trial and error isn't working.

RobZ_inT wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 11:53 am Unfortunately I can't find any instructions on how to use it....and my trial and error isn't working.

You got the quoting of my last post wrong, please edit your post and delete the first end-quote tag.

The wiki has information about the TechDraw Module and there is a TechDraw subforum where you can find lots of and ask for even more information.

chrisb wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 4:43 pm
You got the quoting of my last post wrong, please edit your post and delete the first end-quote tag.

Sorry I was trying for brevity...

RobZ_inT wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 11:53 am Unfortunately I can't find any instructions on how to use it...

Yeah, we need a TechDraw tutorial... I'm currently occupied with a rather huge tutorial rewrite I started... last year!

I recommend you first go to the TechDraw preferences (the TechDraw workbench needs to be loaded) and change your settings:

TechDraw 1 tab

• Projection: Third angle (this is what's used in the US and Canada, the rest of the world uses First Angle)
• Hidden Line: Dash
• Default Template: the one you wish (I'm guessing US Letter), you'll have to browse manually to /usr/share/freecad (or freecad-daily)/Mod/TechDraw/Templates/
• Template Directory: might as well input it too!
• Colors as you wish...

TechDraw 2 tab

• Show Units: check it if you want to show units in dimensions, which we usually do with inches
• Line Group: this defines the line thickness of the views. This is a named setting BTW. If using A4 or US Letter template, the default FC 0.70mm line group is much too thick (0.70mm refers to the line thickness for outer edges). I personally change it to FC 0.35mm. You can also create your own line group, see TechDraw LineGroup

You need to add a page first. Creating views in TechDraw should be pretty straightforward. See TechDraw NewProjGroup.

Now, to add dimensions, you need to first select something: edges or points. Press Ctrl to select the second point. Then, click on the appropriate dimension tool. Once the dim is created, you can pick its label and drag/move it.

Scroll wheel to zoom in/zoom out, Left-click+drag to pan the page. Note that if you left-click+drag when inside a view border, you'll move the view rather than the page.

To edit the text in the page's title block, click on a green square next to a line of text, and a dialog will pop up.

That's about the gist of it...

NormandC wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 4:57 pm

Thanks (Again!). I''l try those preference setting sand see if that helps. From looking at the Tech draw sub-forum, it appears radius has been a past problem as well.

As chrisb implied, TechDraw is in heavy development. It was just introduced in v0.17 back in April. There are already many improvements in the v0.18 development builds which you can have with the freecad-daily PPA. And BTW, both v0.17 and v0.18 can be installed at the same time from the Stable and Daily PPA. That's why we changed the Daily package name to "freecad-daily".

NormandC wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 4:57 pm

RobZ_inT wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 11:53 am Unfortunately I can't find any instructions on how to use it...

Yeah, we need a TechDraw tutorial... I'm currently occupied with a rather huge tutorial rewrite I started... last year!

I recommend you first go to the TechDraw preferences (the TechDraw workbench needs to be loaded) and change your settings:
<SNIP>
That's about the gist of it...

Wow how timely. Thank you ever so much, NormandC, for these initial pointers, and to you, RobZ, for asking.

Coincidentally I was flailing on my own and used the same Basic Part Design file as was presented here. Very helpful indeed.

Craig, AMTELCO

Here is a discussion from a few days back.
https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=30052