All you need to know about Engineering Drawings
You would agree visuals are the best means of communication as it conveys one’s ideas and views easily. This is even more relatable for engineers and machinists. Engineering drawing deals with the preparation of technical drawings for engineering components such as mechanical equipment and buildings. The objective is to define engineering products’ requirements. It contains all the information needed for manufacturing a part or welding and building an assembly. Engineering drawing is not just a matter of illustration. Instead, its purpose is to describe the shapes and sizes of components.
Engineering drawings, a subcategory of technical drawings use standardized language and symbols. This makes understanding the drawings easier to prevent interpretation chances. So, let’s have a quick look at the various lines and view types that you will come across in the engineering discipline.
How to Create Great Drawings?
With the technological advancements, the engineers in the industrial designing industry are progressively adopting Computer-aided design (CAD) software. This designing software comes with numerous advantages over manual drawings. It helps create 2D drawings and 3D models of real-world products before they’re ever produced. The CAD program produces drawing views with only a few clicks & makes it a lot simpler to revise drawings for required revisions.
Essential Components of an Engineering Drawing
Types of Lines
It is important to note that all the lines used in engineering drawings are not equal. Different types of options make it likely to show evident and hidden edges of parts, centerlines, and more. The continuous line is the most commonly used drawing line. It represents the physical boundaries of an object. The line thickness changes — the inner contour uses comparatively thinner lines while outer contours use thicker lines.
The hidden line is another type of line used in drawings. It typically shows points that would not be otherwise visible on the drawings. For instance, it may show the length of an internal step for a turning part may be shown using hidden lines. Centerlines are utilized to show symmetric & holes characteristics of parts. Extension lines can annotate a space that is being measured. And, break lines indicate a broken view.
Different Types of Drawing Views that Serves Variety of Purposes
Isometric Drawings: Each engineering drawing serves a variety of purposes. The vertical lines remain vertical whereas parallel lines are shown at a 30-degree angle. Lines shown in isometric view are in their real length rather than using optical illusions like angled lines.
Orthographic View: This is the most desired view and is also known as bread and better engineering drawing. It is used to represent a 3D object in 2 dimensions. A 2D view communicates everything necessary for part production preventing any kind of distortion of lengths.
Section View: Displays some of the part elements that are not apparent when seeing just from the outset. It brings more clarity and is a preferred option.
Cutout View: Decreases the number of diverse views for a single drawing. It is the desired choice for incorporating every necessary dimension of a cutout.
Detail View: Represents a close-up of certain portions in a larger view. This can be utilized if there are many valuable dimensions in a small area.
Auxilliary View: Represents planes that are neither horizontal nor vertical. It shows inclined surfaces without distortions.
Information Blocks: Have you noticed little boxes that appear at the bottom corner of the engineering drawings? They are information blocks that include additional info such as the author’s name, quantity, part name, number, coating, scale, and more. Some information blocks may also include the prices of materials.
What’s Next?
Engineering drawings remain a big aspect to ensure that manufacturers produce parts that meet the specific needs of the industrial plant. Reading an engineering drawing might seem simpler, but it needs extensive experience and expertise to achieve the anticipated quality and higher accuracy of the final CAD models and drawings. Choosing a reliable 3D CAD company offering a full range of 3D design services can help you achieve desired results.
