Welds in drawings
Tekla Structures shows the welds that you have added in a model as weld seams and weld marks in drawings. You can add both model weld marks and drawing weld marks manually in drawings. Model weld marks refer to welds that have been created in the model. Drawing weld marks do not have an associated physical weld in the model.
How are welds displayed in drawings
Tekla Structures shows the welds that you have added in a model as weld seams and weld marks in drawings. You can also add weld marks manually in an open drawing.
Weld concepts
Model welds are displayed as weld marks and welds or weld seams in drawings. Welds and weld marks can be controlled separately. For example, you may want to show the welds in one drawing view and the weld marks in another.
3D model welds are representations of welds in the real world. Weld solids in drawings are representations of the welds in models. Weld seam is the part of the weld path where the weld solid is drawn. Weld path may consist of several weld seams.
Weld solids are shown in drawings for the following welds:
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Weld solids are shown in drawings for those weld types that have real solid support. Welds that have no real solid support are shown in the model with a hexagonal placeholder, and in drawings weld solids are not shown.
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Custom cross-section welds are also supported.
Weld solids can be shown as outlines or paths, with or without hidden lines.
In the first example, the welds on the right and in the middle are drawn with outlines and own hidden lines. The weld on the left shows the weld path and hidden lines:
The second example is a cross-section of the structure. The welds on the left and in the middle are drawn with outlines, and the weld on the right shows the path. The weld dimensions have been added manually.
The weld symbols inside the weld marks indicate the weld properties defined for the model weld in the model or for the drawing weld mark in the drawing. Below is an example of a model weld seam (in red) and a model weld mark (in green) in a drawing.
In addition to the weld symbols, the weld mark contains a reference line and an arrow. The arrow connects the reference line to the arrow side of a connection. The welds on the arrow and other sides of a part can have different weld properties.
Weld placement
When parts are welded together, you can place welds on:
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The arrow sides only
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The other sides only
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Both the arrow and other sides
The following images describe the basic placement principles of welds.
(1) Above line
(2) Below line
(3) Arrow side for weld
(4) Other side for weld
By default
Tekla Structures places the welds above line according to the ISO standard. You can change this to below line to comply with the AISC standard with the advanced option
XS_AISC_WELD_MARK
.
Model weld properties
To change model weld properties, you need to modify the weld in the model. When you update the model, the weld objects and weld marks are updated in the drawing according to the model changes. In drawings, you can modify the contents and the appearance of the model welds marks and the visibility, representation and appearance of model weld objects.
Weld solids can be shown in single-part, assembly and general arrangement drawings. In general arrangement drawings, you can only change the representation of welds on view and object level, not on drawing level.
Manual weld marks
To add weld marks in an open drawing:
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Select the welds and add a model weld mark through the pop-up menu command Add weld mark.
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Add a drawing weld mark by using the Weld mark command on the Annotations tab.
Add manual drawing weld marks
You can add manual weld marks in an open drawing. Tekla Structures creates manual weld marks using the properties in Weld Mark Properties.
Example: Weld marks added in drawings
In this example, the first image below is the Weld Mark Properties dialog box in a drawing. The weld mark properties are numbered in the dialog box. The second image shows how the weld mark properties are displayed in a weld mark in a drawing. The same numbers are used in the weld mark as in the dialog box to indicate the weld mark property in the weld. Under the images the meaning of different numbers is explained.
(1) Weld prefix
(2) Weld size
(3) Weld type
(4) Weld angle
(5) Weld contour symbol
(6) Weld finishing symbol
(7) Effective throat
(8) Root opening
(9) Edge/Around, here a weld around symbol
(10) Workshop/Site, here a site weld symbol
Add manual model weld marks
You can add marks to model weld marks in an open drawing. Tekla Structures creates model weld marks using the properties defined for the model weld in the model. You can adjust the visibility and appearance settings of the weld mark in the drawing.
Examples: Model welds in drawings
Model welds are welds that you have added in the model. In drawings, they are represented by weld seams and weld marks.
Example 1
In this example, the first image below shows an example of weld properties in the model. You can add welds in the model by selecting one of the welding commands on the ribbon Steel tab. Some of the weld properties are numbered in image, and the second image shows how these properties are shown in a weld mark in a drawing. The same numbers are used in the weld mark to indicate the position and appearance of the property information in the weld.
(1) Edge/Around, weld around symbol is used
(2) Workshop/Site, site weld symbol is used
(3) Weld prefix
(4) Weld type
(5) Weld size
(6) Weld angle
(7) Weld contour symbol
(8) Weld finishing symbol
(9) Effective throat
(10) Root opening
Example 2
The example below shows a staggered, intermittent weld. The length is set to 50 and the pitch to 100.
(1) Staggered, intermittent weld
(2) Length of weld segment
(3) Pitch (center-to-center spacing) of weld segments
Example 3
The example below shows a non-staggered, intermittent weld. The length is set to 50 and the pitch to 100. The pitch is shown in the weld mark when the pitch value is greater than 0.0.
Example 4
Below is an example of a continuous weld.
Example 5
In this example, the staggered, intermittent weld option is selected, and the advanced option
XS_AISC_WELD_MARK
is set to
FALSE
to produce an ISO-compliant weld mark.
Example 6
In this example, the staggered, intermittent weld option is selected like in the previous example, but the advanced option
XS_AISC_WELD_MARK
is set to
TRUE
to produce an AISC-compliant weld mark.
For instructions on how to customize weld symbols, see section "Customize weld type symbols" later in this help article.
Modify model weld mark visibility and appearance in a drawing
Welding properties are set in the model. You can select the welding properties that you want to show in model weld marks in drawings and adjust the appearance of the model weld marks in Weld mark properties.
To select which model weld properties to show, and to modify weld mark properties on drawing view level:
Example
The first example shows a weld mark where a lot of properties are visible:
In the second example, all other welding mark properties have been hidden, except Type from Above line and Below line, and Reference text from Other:
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You can omit welds from drawings by weld type using the advanced option XS_OMITTED_WELD_TYPE. Then you first need to set a value for the Weld size limit.
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You can also customize some weld type symbols.
Modify model weld object representation and appearance in a drawing
You can modify the model weld object representation and appearance manually on object level.
Examples
In the first example below, the welds on the right and in the middle are drawn with outlines and hidden lines. The weld on the left shows the path and hidden lines.
The second example is a cross-section of the structure. The welds on the left and in the middle are drawn with outlines, and the weld on the right shows the path. The welds on the right and left go around the part corner. The welds have manual dimensions.
You can define automatic weld properties for model welds before creating a drawing. You can also modify the weld properties on view level in an open drawing by double-clicking frame of the drawing view containing the weld objects and selecting Weld from the options tree. On drawing and view level, you can also modify the visibility settings.
Drag weld marks
You can drag model welds by the base point of the weld mark leader line along the weld seam. This way you can position the weld marks more optimally for increased clarity in the drawings. Manual drawing weld marks not associated to model welds can be dragged freely.
Having Drawing drag & drop( ) selected makes selecting the leader line base point and dragging it much easier.
Limitation: You cannot drag the weld leader base point to the back-side of a double-sided weld.
Example
The first image below shows the welds in the model.
The second image shows the model weld marks in a drawing. The area within which the weld mark leader line base point can be dragged is indicated with dark green.
Merge weld marks
You can force Tekla Structures to use the same mark and symbol for identical welds in a drawing by merging the weld marks.
Description |
Example |
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Original drawing |
|
Merged weld marks. |
Customize weld type symbols
Most of the weld type symbols are hard coded, but you can edit some of them in Symbol Editor.
The bottom seven symbols in the Type list in model Weld properties and drawing Weld Mark Properties (see image below) are taken from the TS_Welds.sym file. You can edit any of these seven symbols in Symbol Editor to create a custom weld symbol. The rest of the weld symbols are hard coded. Note that the symbol in the Type list does not change when you update the symbol.
- Open Symbol Editor as administrator.
- Click TS_Welds.sym file. and browse to the folder were you have the
- Select the file and click OK.
- Modify the desired symbol.
When doing this, you need to keep the symbol in the same scale as the other symbols. If your symbol is too large to fit in the box, you can let it extend beyond the borders:
- Save the symbol by selecting .
For more information about Symbol Editor, click Symbol Editor User's Guide.