MICROSTATION HATCHING & PATTERNING

Creating Hatches

Hatching is found in Annotate > Patterns (G H):

Note:

Hatching is annotative, which means the actual spacing value will change depending on the Annotation Scale.

Always enter the Spacing you wish to see on the final drawing (e.g. 1mm) and set the Annotation Scale correctly – exactly as you would for text.

A Spacing of 1mm at an Annotation Scale of 1:50 and 1:100:

Enter the Angle for the hatching. Remember, angles read anti-clockwise from horizontal, so 90° is straight up, 270° straight down.

Enter Tolerance (if required). Tolerance defines how accurately hatching matches a curve.

Click on an element to select it for hatching.

The second click identifies the origin point of the hatch. Using this point carefully can ensure that hatching always lines up on multiple elements.

i.e. Always select the same point for the origin of the hatch for all shapes.

All the hatching on all three shapes lines up.

Flood

It isn’t always possible to use a single closed shape to generate hatches. With complex boundaries, and inner shapes to consider, it can sometimes be preferable to use Flood.

Note:  Always check your boundary elements very carefully, and rationalise them wherever possible before flooding. Zero-length vertices and crossing or overlapping boundaries are the main cause of problems when exporting hatches to DWG.

To hatch taking into account inner shapes use the Flood method, with Locate Interior Shapes on:

Associative Hatching

A hatch is always associative unless Drop Pattern is ticked. That means hatching is placed on the same level and in the same symbology as the element it fills, regardless of the active attributes.

If you try to delete a pattern (using Delete Element or by selecting the hatch and hitting the Delete key), the element is also deleted.

To hatch an element associatively but maintain control of the symbology independently, you will need to tick Associative Boundary:

The element will be modifiable along with the pattern, and the pattern will adopt the active symbology.

The hatching can now also be deleted independently of the element.

Change Pattern

To change the line spacing and angle:

Set the values in the Hatch Area tool settings.

Use Change Pattern (G A) with Pattern Parameters ticked.

 

To line-up existing hatches:

Use Change Pattern (G A) with Intersection Point ticked.

Click on the first hatch. Note: you must click on the hatch, not the element.

Click on the origin point to re-hatch the element.

Continue selecting the hatches that you want to line up. Always use the same origin point as on the first hatch: