HATCH — Hatch

Fills a closed boundary with a pattern.

• Command: HATCH · Global name: _HATCH · Alias: H, BH
• Ribbon: Home › Draw
• Menu: Draw
• Toolbar: Draw

Fills a closed area with a pattern of lines, a solid fill or a gradient. While the command runs, the Hatch and Gradient dialog box is shown, with its Hatch tab (the pattern swatches, the scale and the angle) and its Gradient tab; the same can be done on the command line.

Usage

1. Enter HATCH (or H) or click Hatch.
2. In the dialog box, choose the pattern by clicking its swatch and set the scale and the angle (or switch to the Gradient tab: see GRADIENT).
3. Click inside each area you want to hatch (or, with the Select objects option, select its boundaries). The dialog box shows how many boundaries have been found.

Pick internal point or [Select objects/Pattern/sCale/Angle/Gradient/Origin/inHerit/adVanced/dRaw order]:

4. Press Enter or OK to create the hatch. Cancel exits without creating it.

Options

• Select objects (S): select closed polylines, circles, ellipses or splines as boundaries.

Select objects or [Internal point/Pattern/sCale/Angle/Gradient/Origin/inHerit/adVanced/dRaw order]:

• Internal point (I): goes back to picking internal points.
• Pattern (P): enter the pattern name; ? lists them.

Enter a pattern name or [?] <…>:

• sCale (C) and Angle (A): pattern scale (greater than 0) and its rotation in degrees.
• Gradient (G): a gradient instead of the pattern: type, angle and whether it is centered.

Enter gradient name or [?] <…>:

• Origin (O): the point the pattern passes through (for example, the corner of a row of bricks).

Specify new hatch origin:

• inHerit (H): select a hatch and the new one takes its pattern, scale, angle or gradient (not its origin). In the dialog box, Inherit properties button.

Select hatch object:

• adVanced (V): like the advanced options of AutoCAD -HATCH; Enter goes back to the main prompt.

Enter an option [Island detection/Style/Gap tolerance/separate Hatches]:

• Island detection (I): with No, islands are not taken into account.
• Style (S): which islands are filled: Normal (nested ones alternate), Outer (only the area between the boundary and the outermost islands; AutoCAD's default) or Ignore (the whole boundary). All islands and the style are stored, as in AutoCAD.

Enter hatching style [Ignore/Outer/Normal] <…>:

• Gap tolerance (G): the gap tolerance (HPGAPTOL).
• separate Hatches (H): with Yes, each area (each outer boundary with its islands) is a separate hatch.
• dRaw order (R): draw order of the new hatch; by default, behind its boundary, as in AutoCAD.

Enter draw order [do Not assign/send to Back/bring to Front/send beHind boundary/bring in front of bounDary] <…>:

Patterns

SOLID (solid fill), ANSI31, ANSI32, ANSI37, LINE, NET, DOTS, CROSS, BRICK, HONEY and HORMIGON (concrete). The definitions are LinceCAD's own; the names match AutoCAD's when the drawing is the same. HORMIGON is saved as a custom pattern.

Notes

• With an internal point, the program looks for the nearest boundary around it, with its islands (Outer style, unless another one is chosen). Lines, arcs, circles, polylines, ellipses, splines and blocks count; text and dimensions do not. If the boundary has small gaps, HPGAPTOL closes them.
• The hatch is associative: if an object of its boundary is edited (with grips, MOVE, STRETCH...), the hatch is rebuilt to follow it. It stops being associative if the hatch is moved on its own or a boundary object is erased.
• Besides the library, patterns from AutoCAD .pat files are read: acadiso.pat and acad.pat (with several patterns) or NAME.pat (a single one) in the current folder, in those of the LINCE_PATRONES environment variable or in the patrones folder of the user configuration. Their measures are used as they are, with the hatch scale and angle, and the result is a custom pattern.
• TRIM trims hatches: it removes the selected piece between the cutting edges.

See also

HATCHEDIT · GRADIENT · HATCHGENERATEBOUNDARY · BOUNDARY · Hatches