Quick Tip – DWG Link Foreground vs Background

The default setting for linking in a DWG file is one of those things that consistently confuses my users for a couple seconds, and I’m with them. It’s a little obtuse.

First of all, you are linking and not importing, RIGHT?!

Secondly, this is also assuming you are linking your DWG to a single view, and not the entire project. This is not as crucial as NEVER IMPORTING, but we do recommend to our users that it is far easier to link a DWG into two or three views rather than linking it into the entire Revit model and then turning it off in the dozes of views where you don’t want to see it.

Many times when you link in your DWG, you just can’t see it. Quite often, it is hiding behind something in your model; a floor, a ceiling, etc. The default setting for that newly linked DWG is to put it behind everything. This can make it a little game of hide-and-go-seek.

Select that DWG, and you will see the “Draw Layer” parameter. Change it from “Background” to “Foreground” and it will lay on top of all your model content. You might want to click the BRING TO FRONT and BRING TO BACK buttons in the palette, but that just doesn’t work.

Or as Grover liked to say “Near……….far”

Quick Tip – LINK vs IMPORT

Every so often, you may still need to get the linework from an AutoCRAPfile to show up in your Revit views.  I know.  It’s sad, but true.

I am fully in the camp of not needing ACAD to do drafting. I know there are a LOT of folks out there who swear by this process, but I don’t buy it. Time to throw off the crutches, I say!

Once in a blue moon, you may need to get access to ACAD linework in your Revit model. Our rule of thumb is that 99.99% you need to make sure that you are LINKING the .dwg file and not IMPORTING it.

Importing will suck all the linework from the .dwg file and put it into your Revit file, adding each layer as a linetype which can cause chaos and confusion.

Linking the file will give you the classic link “onion skin” effect, where the contents of the .dwg can be seen in your Revit model, but not touched.  Changes to the .dwg can be reflected in the link.  And you can control the appearance (linetype, lineweight, color) of different layers from the linked .dwg by going to the view’s Visibilit Graphics.

LINK, do not IMPORT your .dwgs and your Revit file will be much happier for it.

Fun fact: Revit even when you link in a .dwg, Revit “imports” the contents of the file into your model, it just keeps it in a nice “quarantine”. This is why a linked .dwg will still appear in your model, even when Revit warns you that it can’t find the .dwg file. It’s also why linking in a .dwg file causes your Revit model to bloat up like me at a donut store!