Blocks Coming In at the Wrong Scale & Issues with Block Scale
Quick video
Issue
When you place a block in your drawing, it appears to be coming in at the incorrect scale.
Are you experiencing this issue with block scale in a drawing that includes Xrefs? If so, complete our steps to troubleshoot and correct scale & units in a drawing with Xrefs.
A block is a collection of linework and other components that make up an object in your drawing. Examples of objects composed of a block include a plant, a label, a detail, and a piece of irrigation equipment. When placing one of these objects, you may at times notice that their scale appears to be off. For example, a plant you place in your drawing may appear much larger or smaller than similar objects that are already in your drawing.
You can prevent this type of issue by ALWAYS setting your units and scale before you begin work on a drawing. For more information, see our Set the Scale page. For more information on using scale correctly in AutoCAD, we invite you to watch our Working with Scale Webinar.
If you're experiencing this issue with a block where you are certain that your scale and units are set correctly, you can skip to the Long-Term Fixes section below.
Here's an example. The image below shows a block appearing at the wrong scale. The tiny tree on the right side of the drawing is supposed to be the same size as the three larger trees on the left side. For some reason, it came in at a much smaller size.
Solutions
Irrigation equipment blocks coming in at the wrong scale?
If your irrigation symbols are appearing with the wrong scale in your drawings, make sure to verify that you're using the correct Preference Set and that the scale sliders in that Preference Set are set correctly. For information and instructions, see our Irrigation Symbol Scaling documentation.
Still having issues with the scale of your irrigation equipment blocks after setting the symbol scaling in your Preference Set? Proceed to the steps listed below.
Lighting equipment not scaling to Work Area scale?
Are you noticing that your lighting equipment is not changing scales when placed into differently scaled Work Areas? If so, this is happening because those lighting equipment symbol are using IES files to display the beam spread of the light. In this case, the symbol will only scale based on the plot scale of the drawing. The symbols will not scale again if placed into Work Areas with scales that differ from the overall drawing scale.
For this reason, if you plan to design lighting plans at different scales for the same site plan, we recommend that you create and keep these plans in separate drawings.
If you've already created a great deal of work on your plan and aren't sure what to do at this point, reach out to us in a technical support ticket, and we can help.
Step 1: Delete and purge all incorrectly scaled blocks
First of all, you'll need to get rid of the blocks that are appearing at the wrong scale.
In most cases, this first set of steps alone will solve the problem. Regardless, you'll still need to delete and purge your drawing of the errant blocks by completing the following steps:
1A. Select all blocks in your drawing that are at the wrong scale. Type E (for erase) in the Command line, then press Enter. All selected blocks will be deleted.
1B. Now that you've deleted the errant blocks, you'll still need to purge them from your drawing using the AutoCAD Purge command. Type PRG into the Command line, then press Enter. This command will remove all unused items – including the errant blocks you deleted – from your drawing.
1C. Place an object in your drawing. If it still comes in at the wrong scale, you'll need to try a few additional fixes.
1D. Before you move on to the next potential solution, make sure to delete and purge any errant block (such as the test block you just placed) from the drawing by following the steps described above.
Step 2: Verify and correct your units and scale
If deleting and purging the errant blocks as described above didn't solve your problem, it's time to verify that your units and scale are set correctly. See our documentation sections on:
Step 3: Check for Annotative Scaling
3A. Select a block that's scaling incorrectly.
3B. Type PROP in the Command line and press Enter to open the Properties panel.
Check the Annotative entry. You should see No on this line.
If this line reads Yes, your drawing is set to Annotative Scale, which can interfere with the correct scaling of objects such as blocks.
If so, see our steps for turning Annotative Scale off.
Find out why we don't recommend Annotative Scale for use with our software.
Step 4: Fix the DWG units
If your blocks are still coming in too big or too small after you correct your units and scale, you're likely experiencing a relatively rare AutoCAD bug that is affecting your drawing's scale.
To correct this issue, follow our steps to fix the DWG units.
Step 5: Ensure that you're using the latest Land F/X blocks
Finally, you might be using outdated Land F/X blocks. Follow our steps to get the latest Land F/X blocks.
Step 6: Clean Corruption and Long-Term Fixes
The DWG Units error described above should only occur when your drawing contains Proxy Objects and the Proxy display in the Options dialog box, Open and Save tab is set to Object detect and command invoke, which Autodesk has confirmed as a bug. While the -DWGUNITS steps outlined above provide an effective short-term fix on a single drawing, we recommend following a couple of additional steps to prevent this issue in the future.
Also try the following steps if none of the previous solutions have worked. Test with a copy of the drawing first, with a Save As.
Change Your Object Detect Settings
Open the Options dialog box:
Manage ribbon, Options button
type Options in the Command line
right-click in the Command line, and select Options from the menu
Tools pull-down menu
When the Options dialog box opens, select the Open and Save tab.
The DWG Units error mentioned above occurs when the Download Object ARX apps setting in this box is set to Object detect and command invoke.
To prevent similar errors in the future, we recommend the following settings in the two pull-down menus beneath Object ARX Applications in this dialog box:
- Under Demand load ObjectArx app, select Command invoke.
- Under Proxy images for custom objects, select Do not show proxy graphics.
Clean Your Drawings and All Xrefs
We also recommend that you get in the habit of cleaning your drawings and all Xrefs – especially those you receive from colleagues, consultants, and clients. Cleaning your drawings will prevent drawing corruption and a host of scaling issues by removing Proxy Objects from your drawings and detail sheet files.
Detail Blocks and the Proxy Objects/Drawing Corruption
It's especially important that your detail sheets have ZERO Proxy Objects (the problematic items that can cause drawing corruption). Each detail sheet should be a clean DWG file with just a title sheet. That's why it's integral that you complete our drawing cleanup steps on all your detail sheets. Cleaning your detail drawings in this way will greatly reduce the possibility of corruption and prevent your blocks from appearing at the wrong scale.
Additionally, because details are WBLOCKed out of other drawings, and may include an Xref, your details can contain all those many useless Proxy Objects. So if you open a detail sheet and it's full of proxy objects, it's time to clean.
Learn more about drawing corruption, its causes and solutions:
Contact
- Land F/X
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