Unit 1 - Drawing

Fundamentals
Unit & Lesson Slides
Learning Objectives
Drawings are a core component of the product development
process. Drawings are how engineers and designers communicate
their designs to their colleagues and to the public.

This unit covers the fundamentals of CAD drawings: the rationale

for them, basic components of a drawing, and the industry
standards relevant to drawing creation and interpretation. It also
discusses how to create drawings in Onshape.

At the end of this unit, students should be able to:

1. Explain why drawings are important and where they are
used.
2. Describe what standards are and why they are important.
3. Identify the elements of drawings including units,
dimensions, annotations, construction geometry, formats,
and tables.
4. Create a simple drawing with multiple views and add
dimensions.
Key Concepts
Why Create CAD Drawings?
Drawings are used to document, communicate, and analyze details of a design for manufacturing, inspection and
legal documentation. Drawings are also used to supplement patents or to resolve legal disputes if manufactured
parts don’t fit or work as specified.

This lesson details five of the most common

reasons for creating CAD drawings:

1. Communication
2. Manufacturing
3. Inspection
4. Patents
5. Legal Documentation

Sample drawing from Onshape

CAD Drawings are Communication Tools
CAD tools are used throughout the product development
process, from initial concepts to rendered models.

Once a 3D CAD model is designed, a dimensioned 2D drawing

can be made from it.

In many cases, the drawing is sent to the part manufacturer to

communicate all of the design details of the specified part.

To ensure that everyone reading a CAD drawing interprets it in

the same way, it’s important to follow established practices
and standards for drawing creation.
CAD Drawings for Manufacturing
How a hole pattern is drawn might change how the actual set of holes is manufactured.
Example: They may be circular if centered around a hole, or rectangular if measured from a corner

Circular centermarks are needed for Linear centermarks work for the truck
the propeller face plate because it base plate on the skateboard even
rotates and must be balanced though it is circular since the
around the central axis. measurements are with respect to the
sides of the truck.
CAD Drawings for Manufacturing
When to use circular vs. linear centermarks

Circular Centermarks Linear Centermarks

● Used if radial/diametral position of Used if linear/Cartesian position
features are important. of features are important.
● Indicate feature centers are on a common
diameter.
● If features are not evenly spaced, must
add angular dimensions to define
positions
● Otherwise, equal spacing is assumed.
CAD Drawings for Inspection
Example: How we might dimension something to enable
measurement with a specific metrology instrument.
Flatness
tolerance zone
The flatness of the backside of the
shears is more important to insure so
that the jaws cut correctly, than are
the size dimensions, e.g. The shears
could vary in thickness so long as the
faces are flat.

Flatness error values

Testing for flatness where the indicator reading is

the flatness error, or deviation from ideal.
CAD Drawings for Patents
If someone has an idea that they want patented, CAD
drawings are essential. As indicated by the excerpt from the US
Patent and Trademark Office guidelines below, drawings (or
photographs) are the complete visual representation of your idea.

“The drawing disclosure is the most important element of the application.

Sample drawings used in patents
Every design patent application must include either a drawing or a black and
white photograph of the claimed design. As the drawing or photograph
constitutes the entire visual disclosure of the claim, it is of utmost importance
that the drawing or photograph be clear and complete, that nothing regarding
the design sought to be patented is left to conjecture.”

“The drawings or photographs should contain a sufficient number of views to

completely disclose the appearance of the claimed design, i.e., front, rear, right
and left sides, top and bottom. While not required, it is suggested that
perspective views be submitted to clearly show the appearance and shape of
three-dimensional designs.”

Source: Design Patent Application Guide

https://www.uspto.gov/patents/basics/types-patent-applications/design-patent-application-guide#drawings
CAD Drawings as Legal Documents
CAD drawings can serve as important legal documents in patent or contract disputes.
For example, preparing for a large promotion of a quadcopter kit for do-it-yourselfers, a start-up company contracted with a manufacturing firm
to produce 10,000 motor arms using injection molding, but when the parts were delivered to the start-up, they didn’t fit.

The start-up company reviewed their production drawings and compared them to the parts to show the inconsistencies, and found that the
drawings were correct and the manufacturer had made an error.

The manufacturing company replaced the arms with new parts at their own cost since the production drawings had not been followed.

If the dispute had gone to court, the drawings would have been key evidence to show which party was liable for the error.
Drawing Standards
Why Do We Care About Standards?
Conventions are essential for clear and unambiguous communication. In a world where
engineers and manufacturers might be in different countries and speak different languages,
CAD drawings can serve as a universal language for design.
A drawing communicates all necessary manufacturing information from the engineer
who designed a part to the workers who will make it and inspect it.
Engineering drawings are legal documents. When an individual or company invests in
having their part manufactured, accurate drawings can ensure that the process is done
correctly. And, if there are errors or omissions, drawings can be used to determine liability.
While no drawing will be interpreted exactly the same by all groups all of the time, the goal is to
employ standards to create drawings that are as clear and clean and simple as possible to
minimize confusion.
Drawings Standards
There are two primary standards organizations:
● American National Standards Institute (ANSI)
○ The agency in charge of setting drawing standards for ANSI is ASME (American Society of Mechanical
Engineers)
○ There are several documents published by ASME that cover various aspects of mechanical drawings
○ A few that we are most concerned with in these units:
■ ASME Y14.100-2017 Engineering Drawing Practices
■ ASME Y14.1-2020 Decimal Inch Drawing Sheet Size and Format
■ ASME Y14.5 – 2018 Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing

● International Organization for Standardization (ISO)

○ ISO publishes Geometrical Product Specification (GPS)
○ ISO GPS documents can be found at https://www.iso.org/home.html

Note: Different standards are used in different countries and industries, so it is important to consider
who will be reading your drawings, various industry norms, or supplier expectations.
Example: Standards Enable Innovation
The Waltham Watch Company began its operations in 1854 and, through innovation,
introduced a system of interchangeable parts. Thanks in part to strict standards, the
company developed processes that could make watch parts so precisely that they
were interchangeable with one another.

Rather than making custom watches one at a time, these interchangeable parts
allowed for mass production – an innovation that served to catapult productivity and
place the Waltham Watch Company on the international forefront as the first
company to mass produce a complete watch under one roof. Mass production also
decreased prices and increased accessibility of watches for a broader population.

Source: https://www.walthamwatchfactory.com/history/
Drawings Components
and Properties
Drawings Components and Properties
There are many different components and properties that make
a well-formed and complete CAD drawing. These include:

● Units and precision

● Dimensions
● Annotations
● Views
● Construction geometry
● Formats
● Tables
● Inspection

In Onshape, settings that allow a user to customize all of these

elements can be found by clicking on the wrench icon on the
right-hand side of an Onshape CAD drawing.

In this lesson, we’ll provide an overview of why each of these items

Onshape’s Drawing properties panel
is important and best practices for their use. Future lessons will
take a deeper dive into some of these topics.
Units and Precision
Different types of drawings may require different units, In Onshape, use the
depending on the application. Units and precision
Onshape will let you choose between several different formats. tool box to set the
Here’s an example of how a single dimension will look with each. units for your
desired precision
These are just for display on a drawing, and can be different from and formatting.
the workspace units.

Two decimal
Unit Example precision is
sufficient in many
Inches 12.875 engineering
applications.
Inches Fractional 12 7/8
Millimeters 327.025
Feet and Inches 1'-0 7/8"
Mismatched units
Agreeing on and setting your units correctly can be the
difference between success and failure.

In September of 1999, after almost 10 months of travel, the

Mars Climate Orbiter arrived at Mars. On entry into the
Martian atmosphere, it burned and broke into pieces.

Upon investigation, NASA discovered that the failure was

due to mismatched units. The navigation system used
metric units, but the commands from Earth were sent in
English units.

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mars_Climate_Orbiter_-_launch.jpg
Source: https://www.simscale.com/blog/nasa-mars-climate-orbiter-metric/
Dimensions
Dimensions are used in CAD Drawings to specify
model details, where features are, how big they are,
and how they relate to other model features.

There are many different types of dimensions.

Drawing standards dictate when and how each
should be used, but a CAD engineer has some
freedom to edit some aspects of the style and
appearance of dimensions on the drawing.

A couple rules of thumb:

● Include enough dimensions to fully define the
part. Over-dimensioning a part can make the
drawing confusing.
● Dimensions should be based on the function
of the part. They should be clear, and convey
the design intent.
Annotations and Callouts
Annotations are notes added to the drawing that
clarify or provide specific information relevant to
Notes tool
the part. These can include information on holes,
weldments, etc. Hole callout tool

Always use official annotations, such as “THRU,”

defined in the ANSI standards.

Onshape has several tools for adding annotations and

callouts.

Use the Annotations dialog

In this engine housing, there are a lot of box in Onshape to set the
holes. Annotations or callouts help annotation preferences. We’ll
distinguish which holes are threaded, go into more depth about
through holes, countersunk, etc. hole callouts and notes in a
later section.
Views
Views are the basic method of representing the
geometry of the part or assembly that is being
documented. An important concept in drawing is
that any geometry that is dimensioned must
represent the actual or scaled measurements of the
part. Pictorial view

There are two types of views used in drawings:

orthogonal and pictorial. In orthogonal views, the
line of sight is perpendicular to one of the main
viewing planes (“ortho” is Greek for “right angle”).
Orthogonal views
Pictorial views include non-orthogonal rotations of
the part. These views are used for illustrative
purposes and are not dimensioned.
Construction geometry
Construction geometry is used to further clarify drawings. For example, a
common way to indicate the location of a hole is with a centerline or crosshair.
Centerlines are also commonly used to indicate symmetry.

Other construction geometry can indicate sharp corners when rounds or fillets
are added and any other clarifying additional lines or splines.

Use the construction

Center crosshair and centerlines geometry dialog box to
set or change
preferences

Extension (witness) lines to show dimension extents

Formats
All together,
the drawing
elements
Notes to specify shown at left
standards,
materials,etc.
Drawing revisions are referred to
as the drawing
“frame” or
“format”
Drawing border, Space for drawing
used to allow easy views and
reference to some dimensions
part of the drawing

Title block
Format properties
can be changed in
Tolerance block
the formats dialog
box
Standard format sizes

English: A = 8.5” X 11” English: B = 11” X 17” When creating a

Metric: A4 = 210 X 297 Metric: A3 = 297 X 420 drawing, the user can
choose the size and
English: C = 17” X 22” format type from
Metric: A2 = 420 X 594 standard Onshape
formats or create
their own.

English: E = 34” X 44”

Metric: A0 = 841 X 1189
Important note: Throughout these units, we will often
English: D = 22” X 34”
use A-size and B-sized sheets for ease of viewing. But
Metric: A1 = 594 X 841
C-size and above are more common, and often
preferred, for anything other than extremely simple
parts.
Tables
Various tables can be added to drawings to specify revisions,
bills of materials, coordinates, or other information necessary
to manufacture or document a product.

Table preferences
can be changed
in the tables
dialog box.
Inspection
When a dimension is going to be used as an inspection dimension, meaning the dimension
will be inspected for product or part quality assurance, the dimension can be called out
using inspection callouts. These are numbered and are highlighted typically with a circle
and colored outline or background.

You can specify

the shape and
color of the
callout in the
Inspection dialog
box

Inspection Callouts
Summary of Drawing Components
All the elements of a drawing are tools to help clearly
document the geometry of parts and assemblies.
Each element provides information necessary for
manufacturing, documenting and inspecting parts
and products.

When all these elements come together in the right

way, a drawing is a powerful method of
communicating how to produce a part.

Many of the elements described above require

further explanation and will be addressed with more
detail in later sections.
Drawings in Onshape
Drawings in Onshape
Every CAD platform works differently, but most are
capable of producing an industry standards-aligned
CAD drawing.

In this lesson, we’ll provide a brief overview of how to

create and update a drawing in Onshape as part of a
product development process..

Topics:

1. Drawing creation
2. Drawing templates
3. Updating drawings
Drawing Creation
There are three simple ways to
1
create a drawing in Onshape:

1. Create a drawing of a specific part

3
in a part studio by right-clicking
the part in the parts list and
choosing “Create Drawing of [Part
Name].”
2. Create an empty drawing by
clicking the plus in the left end of
the tab bar and choosing “Create
Drawing…”
3. Create a drawing of an assembly
by right-clicking on the assembly
tab and choosing “Create Drawing
of [Assembly Name].”
2
Drawing Templates
When creating a drawing, you will be
prompted to choose a drawing
template.

Drawing templates determine a few

key parameters:
● The standard format, ISO or
ANSI
● The units that will be shown on
the drawing by default
● The size of the drawing page
with respect to the default size ANSI (English)] ISO (Metric)
of any views of the parts shown A = 8.5” x 11” A4 = 210 mm x 297 mm
on it B = 11” x 17” A3 = 297 mm x 420 mm
C = 17” x 22” A2 = 420 mm x 594 mm
D = 22” x 34” A1 = 594 mm x 841 mm
The standard page sizes for each E = 34” x 44” A0 = 841 mm x 1189 mm

template size are shown at right.

Updating Drawings
It’s very common in product
development that a part or assembly
will change even after initial drawings
are created.

Because Onshape is a cloud-native

parametric CAD platform, any change
you make in a part or assembly can
be updated on a drawing.

The good news is that a drawings can be updated as the design process
progresses with the simple click of a button at the top of the Onshape
drawing interface on the feature toolbar.
AGENDA

Practice
Create a Copy of This Document
For the practice and exercises in this unit, you will need your own editable copy of this document.

Option 1: Click the blue “Make a copy to edit” button at the top of the Onshape interface.

Option 2: Click the main document menu, and select “Copy workspace…”
Practice 1: Create a Drawing
1. Find the Motorcycle assembly tab.
2. Right-click on the tab or the assembly in the
model tree and select “Create Drawing of
Motorcycle...”
3. Select the ANSI_A_INCH drawing format with
four predefined views.
4. Now create a new drawing by following the
preceding steps but this time select the
ISO_A4 drawing format with predefined views.
5. Compare and contrast the two formats. What
is the same and what is different?

We’ll explain more about the differences between ISO and ANSI
standards in Unit 7, as well as the different views in Unit 3.
ANSI Standard ISO Standard
Practice 2: Add Dimensions
1. Open the drawing you made of the motorcycle.
2. Select the Dimension tool at the top of the Onshape interface.
3. Add a linear dimension by clicking two points on the
motorcycle and then clicking a third time to place the
dimension.
4. Add a radial dimension by clicking a circular edge of a wheel or Use the drawing
tire and then click a second time to place the dimension. properties
right-side panel
to set the
dimension
preferences
Practice 3: Inserting Views
1. Click the plus sign at the bottom-left of this document and select
“Create Drawing…”
2. Select the ANSI_A_INCH template with No views.
3. Select the Alignment Plate from the selection dialog box.
4. In the Insert view dialog box, change View orientation to Top and the
View scale to 2:1. Step 4
5. Click in the drawing to place the top view, then click to the right of
the top view to place the projected right view.

Step 5
Step 2 Step 3
AGENDA

Exercises
Create a Copy of This Document
If you haven’t already done so, for the practice and exercises in this unit, you will
need your own editable copy of this document.

Option 1: Click the blue “Make a copy to edit” button at the top of the Onshape
interface.

Option 2: Click the main document menu, and select “Copy workspace…”
Exercise Objectives
The purpose of these exercises is to give students the opportunity to practice creating
simple parts and drawings.

The specific skills addressed are:

1. Basic modeling skills:
a. Sketching (constraints, linear dimensions, circular features, patterns),
b. Extrude (add and remove),
c. Fillets and chamfers
2. Choosing an appropriate drawing standard (ISO, ANSI), format and size
3. Inserting standard orthogonal views and determining which views and how many
4. Inserting dimensions including adding clarifying notes (4X, TYP, etc.)
5. Adding notes
6. Using radial dimensioning schemes as well as cartesian dimensioning schemes
Exercise - Level 1
Create the alignment plate shown below and create a drawing with appropriate dimensions. Remember, the
goal is to create enough dimensions that the part design is completely communicated, without confusing or
redundant dimensions.

Tips:
1. Review the earlier practice exercises for help with
inserting views and placing dimensions.
2. To add annotations like “2X” double-click a placed
dimension and add the appropriate annotations.
3. Use the centerline tools (see picture below) to
add centerlines and centermarks.
Exercise - Level 2
Model the propeller face plate and then make a drawing with the appropriate dimensions.
Note the use of:
● Hidden lines
● Circular centermarks
● Construction geometry
● Notes indicating patterns

Tip: Review the earlier exercise and practice

for help with inserting views, placing
dimensions, and adding centerlines.
Exercise - Level 3
Model the skateboard truck baseplate shown below and then document it appropriately with a drawing.
Summary
This unit introduced the concept of CAD drawings and why they are important.
You should now understand:
● The basic components of a drawing
● How to create drawings in Onshape

In Unit 2, we dive into some of the various drawing types and their uses.