Working With Grid Drawings

If you’ve ever worked with a woodworking plan that includes a scaled-down drawing, you might have wondered how to transfer that to a full-sized pattern that you can use to produce parts for your project. You know that if you try to just “eyeball it” you will end up with something that might not be the right size, and can have unwelcome variations in the shape. Curves are particularly difficult when it comes to scaling up plans to a usable template.

George provides a foolproof method for transferring reduced-scale drawings to full-size drawings that you can make your project parts from:

Know your scale. The reduction in size that was used by the plan provider should be indicated on the drawings. A scale of 1:4 is common, but it will be important to observe the actual reduction that was used in the plan that you are using.

Get yourself some 1” grid paper. It’s easiest to work in 1” increments, so you will want to pick up some 1” graph paper, such as this product.

Flexible curve is helpful. When you have to transfer a curved line, it helps to use a flexible curve that can be manipulated to the shape that you want, then used to trace the curved line onto your full-sized drawing.

Transfer with care. Start by transferring any straight lines, building out a framework as a starting point. From there, you can begin to use your flexible curve to transfer curves, achieving an exact full-sized representation of the scaled down drawing that you are using as a reference. By breaking down the transfer process one square at a time, you can keep yourself on track with great accuracy.

After you master the art of transfer a complex drawing, explore more content on workshop math and geometry.