2004

82 | Chapter 7 Start and Save a Drawing
To start a drawing by selecting a template file
1 On the File menu, click New.
2 In the Select Template dialog box, scroll through the list of templates and
select a template from the list and click Open.
AutoCAD opens the drawing as drawing1.dwg. The default drawing name
changes to reflect the number of new drawings that have been opened.
For example, if you open another drawing from a template, the default
drawing name is drawing2.dwg.
If you want to start a new drawing with no template file, click the arrow
next to the Open button and then click one of the “no template” options
from the list.
Command line
NEW
To create a drawing template file from an existing drawing
1 On the File menu, click Open.
2 In the Select File dialog box, select the file you want to use as a template
and click OK.
3 If you want to delete the existing file contents, from the Modify menu,
choose Erase.
4 At the Select Objects prompt, enter all, and then select the border and title
block (if you want to remove them) and enter r (Remove).
5 On the File menu, click Save As.
6 In the Save Drawing As dialog box under Files of Type, select the Drawing
Template file type.
DWT files must be saved in AutoCAD LT
®
2004 format. To create a DWT
file in AutoCAD 2000 format, save the file in the AutoCAD 2000 DWG
format and then rename the DWG file using a DWT extension.
7 In the File Name box, enter a name for the template. Click Save.
8 Enter a description of the template and click OK.
The new template is saved in the template folder.
Standard toolbar
Command line
OPEN
To recover the default drawing template files
1 On the File menu, click New.