After adding a few initial dimensions to our completed drawing, we may wish to adjust the dimension style. We show you how in our Autocad 2D training courses.
In the Windows version we go to the Annotate tab and the Dimensions section and click on the small arrow icon on the bottom right of the section. This opens up our dialog box for the dimension style. In the Macintosh version of the Autocad we go to the Dimension drop-down menu and choose Dimension Style.
We can at this point either Modify the existing style or create a New one – this will be saved with the drawing.
The first thing we need to change is the Decimal Separator under the Primary Units tab. For some reason Autocad’s default is the Comma, which is used widely in Europe but not in Australia, the UK or the States. So change this to Period. You can see the numbers update in the small preview window.
We may also wish to change the Precision to 0, depending on the scale of our drawings. For very small drawings, for example, for machine parts or micro-chips, we may need 0.00 or smaller, but generally we want to round up to whole numbers for millimeters.
Other options are under the Symbols and Arrows tab – we may wish to change the symbol from solid arrow to Oblique or Architectural Tick, again depending on the industry. Alternate Units and Tolerances tabs are also available for engineering drawing styles. Hit OK when done.
If we wish to update any previous dimensions use the Update button  on the Dimensions panel. If we save this drawing as a template, our new dimension styles will be saved also, and will be available whenever we create a new drawing. In this way we build up all our requisite styles into our working templates.
More information on all features of the program can be found at the AutoDesk website. And see many examples of our clients’ work on our Facebook page.
Other related Autocad 2d Blog Posts:

• Autocad 2d basics
• Autocad 2d introduction
• Autocad 2d drawing
• Autocad 2d workspace
• Autocad 2d isometric