Blog Archives

Autocad MEP Fatal Error on Unreconciled New Layer

Layer reconciliation was introduced on the Autocad 2008 products (AUTOCAD MEP 2008, AUTOCAD 2008). As I understand this is an Autocad 2008 notification to inform the user that there is a new layer being added – specially if you are xrefing a drawing. Very helpful for people who are strict in their layer setting and standard. But for those who will just use the external drawing as a reference, this layer reconciliation turns out to be annoying rather than helpful.

fatal-error-layer-reconcile

When you see the “Unreconciled New Layers” notification on the bottom right corner of your drawing screen it is always a good idea to view the unreconciled new layers in layer properties manager and fix the layer otherwise this will surely bug you when you plot your drawings. Believe me! because if you are going to plot the drawing without reconciling the layers, the plot notification dialog box about the unreconciled object will pop up many times. If you have 50 unreconciled layers you have to act on 50 popup box before you complete your plot command. The friendly Ctrl+alt+del will come to the rescue, should you find yourself in a hard situation like this (boss is standing behind you, waiting for the print out of drawing :) ) Continue reading …

Fatal Error: Unhandled Access while exporting to Autocad MEP 2008 to Autocad

For people who uses Autocad MEP 2008 extensively on their project I know that the famous line “Fatal Error: Unhandled Access Violation Reading blah blah blah…” is not new to you anymore. In some point of your drafting time I do believe that this error dialog box had already introduce itself so you’ll not be surprised if it pop up to your screen withoug giving you warning.

Its’ latest sighting is yesterday when an Electrical Autocad Technician is trying to convert an MEP2 2008 drawing to plain Autocad. Engineers from site requested him an Autocad version of one of the Electrical drawings of the project which we created in Autocad MEP (Previously ABS 2007.1) for their reference. For them to open the drawings properly the cad operator should convert it first to plain cad version otherwise the objects in the requested drawing will just appear like a series of rectangles and N/A. This problem has been mentioned in this post Autocad MEP Problems / Bugs.

So back to the simple file conversion task, normally to convert the MEP 2008 drawings to a plain Autocad version. Here are the common ways to make it happen.

  • by envoking the command: “etransmit”
  • by exporting to autocad, command: “_AecExportToAutoCAD2004“
  • by converting to dxf via command: “dxfout”

He chose the second and to his surprise the friendly Unhandled Access Fatal Error showed. So this is the case where I have to enter the CADD scene to act like Mr. Cadd Inspector. I have to find a way to export the problematic MEP 2008 file to Autocad and the same time explore the problem.

autocad-mep-2008-fatal-error

Continue reading …

Revisiting Autocad MEP 2008 Bugs / Problem

With AutoCAD MEP 2008 as a MEP software being used in our company, I have encountered quite a few notable bugs or problems that I hope will be settled on this year’s upgrade.

Here is the list. When I receive the upgrade I’m going to return in this post to see if Autodesk take it into consideration, a bug fix or improvement nonetheless.

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New Features of Autocad MEP 2009

While I’m waiting for the AutoCAD MEP 2009 upgrade from Autodesk, I check the world wide web to know what will be the new promises of the software that will replace Autocad MEP 2008.

Here are the new features other than what mentioned in the product brochure. Thanks Toby (autodesk) for sharing this info to us.

Interference Detection
This is a new tool to check for collisions between objects in AutoCAD MEP. The tool allows you to find hard and soft collisions (such as clearances), zoom into the problem area, resolve the issue and navigate to the next one. Check boxes allow you to select which MEP objects to check as well as different building elements to check against.

Part Numbering
This is a new annotation tool used to number Duct and Pipe parts for scheduling. This replaces the Pipe and Duct Fabrication tag tools formerly found only in the UK profile. You can number individual objects or a system of connected objects. As items are added or deleted, you can update the numbering or re-number the entire run. There is also an option to use the same part number for identical parts.

Continue reading …