DICKEYBIRD

What font do you folks that have been published in the model mags use in your AutoCAD drawn plans? I use TurboCAD and have several published plans that came through the process OK other than a few weird lettering issues. I have a new one about ready to ship and thought I'd try a different font this time around.

CoosBayLumber

My Feedback: (1)

There really are only two types of fonts used in Acad drawings. The pen types and those like the True-Type which only work within Windows applications.

The pen types can be downloaded at CADALOG, and are not so often used today. If while in windows you open up a drawing file which contains both types, and are on some Non-Autodesk software, it will immediately go into emergency stop. Whereas Acad will keep going and open up the whole drawing for revision or viewing. The situation with the pen fonts is that they are the only text to which machine tools can operate and reproduce, for they are made up of lines, not dots. The pen fonts have been around since the middle 1980's and only seem to work with Acad based software today.

The raster fonts, like True-type, will only work in windows applications. The also will not transferr over direct to machine tool languages. But they sure look pretty, and come out nice looking on some inkjet plotter or printer. As I interchange direct with folks who operate withinthe machine tool language industry, I work only with pen fonts. Those having extensions with an .SHX or .SHP and thus have no need for TrueType fonts to be called up as available within any CAD software.

Many CAD software vendors have dropped support for the pen language fonts, for they are in the business of making drawings, not making items. My old version of Intellicad and TurboCAD support pen fonts, and any alterations along the way. These CAD softwares then become interchangeable direct to G-code, H-PGL, ISG and other machine tool languages. Ship a file to an outside firm with TrueType or Windows based fonts, and there isn't any text shown on the finished product. Lot of CAD users think that the basic TXT or Standard (as Autodesk referrs to it) is a dual compatible font. It really is a basic DOS font, and often will not permit a CAD software to alter the format.

Wm.

dreadnaut

My Feedback: (5)

You cannot go wrong using Romans. It is clear, consise, and supported by any platform that has AutoCAD installed. Beware of using that really cool font you downloaded from some where, because there is no guarantee that it will come out on another computer. I recall an incident where a company I was consulting had to hand letter stacks of drawings that were done by a commercial printer because because some kid changed the setup I did by replacing Romans with a really cool font that the printer did not support. They had to work through the night to make a deadline.

SoCal GliderGuider

I've found pushing the Autocad drawing through a PDF generator the only way to get and keep the desired font(s). Lately I've been DWF'g the sheets then pushing these (from Acad's DWF viewer) through the Adobe PDF drivers as the only way to get reasonably small files. Same printed output but scads less time online sending them to the printers.

As an example a seven sheet Acad drawing (24x36 sheets with extensive model space design development) is 712 KB. The PDF using Adobe's Acad add-in is 2,930 KB. Now pushing the sheets out as DWF's takes them down to 147 KB. Printing these out of the DWF viewer then combining them as a multi sheet PDF results in a file size of 328 KB.

There are other after market PDF printer drivers that have been reviewed here and on RC Groups. YMMV.