Changing the Hatch Area

Changing the Hatch Area
You may have noticed the Associative option in the Hatch And Gradient dialog box. When this
radio button is selected, AutoCAD creates an associative hatch pattern. Associative hatches adjust
their shapes to any changes in their associated boundary; hence the name. The following exercise
demonstrates how this works.
Suppose you want to enlarge the tiled area of the kitchen by one tile. Here’s how it’s done:
1. Return to the Unit file (choose Window  \directory path\Unit.dwg); then, click the outline
border of the hatch pattern you created earlier. Notice the grips that appear around the
hatch-pattern area.
2. Shift+click the grip in the lower-left corner of the hatch area.
TIP If the boundary of the hatch pattern consists of line segments, you can use a crossing window
or polygon-crossing window to select the corner grips of the hatch pattern.
3. With the lower-left grip highlighted, Shift+click the lower-right grip.
4. Click the lower-right grip again, but don’t Shift+click this time.
5. Enter @12<–90↵↵ (@30<–90 for metric users) to widen the hatch pattern by 1´. The hatch
pattern adjusts to the new size of the hatch boundary.
6. Press the Esc key twice to clear any grip selections.
7. Choose File  Save to save the Unit file.
8. Return to the Plan file (choose Window  \directory path\Plan.dwg), and repeat the
steps in the exercise in the “Updating a Block From an External File” section, earlier in this
chapter, to update the units again.
The Associative feature of hatch patterns can save time when you need to modify your drawing,
but you need to be aware of its limitations. A hatch pattern can lose its associativity when you do
any of the following:
◆ Erase or explode a hatch boundary.
◆ Erase or explode a block that forms part of the boundary.
◆ Move a hatch pattern away from its boundary.
These situations frequently arise when you edit an unfamiliar drawing. Often, boundary objects
are placed on a layer that is off or frozen, so the boundary objects aren’t visible. Or the hatch pattern
might be on a layer that is turned off, and you proceed to edit the file, not knowing that a hatch pattern
exists. When you encounter such a file, take a moment to check for hatch boundaries so you can
deal with them properly.