AutoCAD UCS

Introduction

When working with AutoCAD, a situation might occur where you need to draw large portions of your drawing at an angle. This can of course be done by inputting the angle of each line and by making use of the OTRACK options, but this is not very efficient.

Let's say, for instance, that we want to draw a large portion of our drawing at an angle of 57 degrees:

In putting an angle for each line you draw will work, but this is a very time consuming method.

It's much quicker to 'tell' AutoCAD you want to draw at an angle of 57 degrees.

This can be done by changing the orientation off the x and y axis. As we can see, the x-axis is horizontal and the y-axis is vertical right now. To change the direction of these axes we need to change the user coordinate system (UCS).

UCS Toolbar

Right click on an empty part of the tool bars > ACAD > UCS.

The UCS toolbar will appear:

Rotating the UCS

Because we want to change the orientation off the X and Y axes, we need to rotate around the Z axis.

Press , and specify the rotation angle, in our case 57 degrees, and finish by pressing [enter]:

If we look at the Y and X axes, it's evident that there orientation has changed.

Note that the cursor itself has changed to an angle of 57 degrees as well.

If we now draw a rectangle, it will automatically be drawn at an angle:

Saving UCS settings - Named UCS

It's possible to save a UCS orientation by clicking on so that the following screen will appear:

Right now, our UCS is called Unnamed, so double-click on the name and change it to, for instance, rotation 57.

Close the window by pressing OK.

If you're working with more than one UCS, and you want to quickly change between them, it's best to use the UCS II.

The UCS II toolbar can be opened by right-clicking on an empty spot of a toolbar -> ACAD -> UCS II :

The desired UCS can be selected in the dropdown box.

Rotating your view to match the UCS

Changing your UCS is a great way to quickly draw at an angle; the UCS can also be used to rotate the entire viewscreen. This is especially useful when drawing something like an elevation which has a different angle to other parts of a drawing, or for changing a viewport in paperspace.

To rotate the entire viewscreen to the same angle as the current UCS, type 'plan' in the command bar and select Current UCS:

The entire viewscreen will now rotate to the same angle as the current UCS, in our case 57 degrees:

To change the viewscreen back to its original rotation angle, type 'plan' and select 'World' in the command bar.