21
That time a senior drafter told me to stop using so many layers
I was about 2 years into drafting and thought I was being super organized with like 40 layers for every project. One of the old guys looked over my shoulder and said 'you're making more work for yourself, not less.' He showed me how he did it with just 6 or 7 main layers and used line colors and linetypes for the rest. After I tried it on one job I cut my drafting time by probably 30%. Has anyone else had a senior totally overhaul their file setup?
2 comments
Log in to join the discussion
Log In2 Comments
caleb_ross123d ago
Oh man that's such a classic moment! I had almost the exact same thing happen to me about a year into drafting. I was using like 50 layers on everything and this old timer just shook his head and showed me his setup. He used maybe 8 layers and relied on lineweights and colors to handle the rest. It took me a minute to trust it but once I did my files were way cleaner and way faster to work with. I also stopped having to scroll through this giant list of layers every time I wanted to change something. These old drafters might seem outdated but they know some real shortcuts that save you hours.
8
derek6562d ago
...which is fine and all, but I gotta say @caleb_ross12, I don't think it's that deep. Like, yeah, fewer layers is cleaner, but 50 layers? If you're working on something complex, sometimes you just need that many to keep track of stuff. The old timer's way works for him, but it's not some universal truth everyone has to follow. I've seen people go down to 8 layers and then spend hours trying to figure out which lineweight does what because they keep forgetting the color code. It's just a preference thing, not some life changing hack. Some of us like having our layers spelled out (you know, like "Electrical - Lighting" and "Structural - Columns") and that's fine too.
3