What are elevations?

[DaveZR2]

Hi,

We are a manufacturer of laboratory equipment. Recently we have been getting requests for CAD Blocks of our equipment that can be inserted into architectural drawings.

To do this I've been creating 2D top view drawings of our product in AutoCAD 2006. I was pretty proud of myself.

...Until recently someone came back to us and asked if we had CAD files with "plans and elevations". I thought elevations just meant specifying the height of the machine, but apparently not since I had that on the original drawings that I had sent to this architect.

Does anyone have a clue what I need to do? I'd ask the architect but I'd rather try here first since it's slightly important that we don't look clueless to them.

I'd appreciate any advice you can give me.

Thanks

 

[insideman]

"Elevation" is an architect's term for what an engineer would call a "side view". So a front elevation would be a front view, etc.

Architects use "plan" for what we call "top view".

 

[DaveZR2]

Thanks insideman!

So do architects insert "elevation" blocks into a to-scale layout of some sort or are they just for reference?

Thanks again for the help.

Dave

 

[chicopee]

Not only a front view but it could also be a right side ,left side and rear views depending how sophisticated the object is, bit as insideman said it is primarily a front view.

 

[PeterCharles]

I'm an engineer and started "Engineering Drawing" in school at the age of 13 (now 61). There were always plan and elevation views on our drawings then and ever since, NEVER top, side or end views.

 

[chicopee]

PeterCharles,let me explain, lets say that you are drawing a house and you want to show the front, sides and rear of the house framing and concrete footing, when dimensioning these views much of the dimensions will show elevation values instead instead of plain dimensions.

 

[hemis]

I prepare architectural drawings for architects and engineers using autocad. The elevations, plans and sections have to be as accurate as possible. When I ask someone as yourself for details, I want the product to fit into my "virtual" building. How it looks is important but accurate dimensions and fixing positions are essential.

I have some appalling "elevations" of objects which did not fit the building when built.

If you get stuck in the future, there are some good sites showing these details