Expert: J. B. Borge - 2/11/2005

Question
Please advise:
We started with a drawing emailed from our Customer.  We revised it, and also used it as a template for a few other drawings.  All the content is in model space.
Now when we email the drawing(s) back to Customer, his AutoCAD 2002 simply crashes by exiting, when he tries to open the drawing.  We have audited the drawing.  We have cut the content, then purged and cleared and pasted the content back.  We have emailed various attempts: save as from 2002 as DWG R14, DWG 2000, DXF R14, DXF 2000.  We also attempted from our LT 2002 seat by saving as DWG 2000, and as DWG R14.  
The Customer has tried two different computers, both will crash.
The drawing can make a complete email loop back to us and we can open it upon return, so it doesn't seem to get corrupted in transmission.  
We have no problem opening drawings they send to us.
Thank you,
Dennis Hoffman
www.dlsteiner.com

Answer
Hi Dennis, is the drawing you're sending using xref's by any chance? if so, bind xrefs to the drawing. also, try exploding all of the blocks inserted in this drawing. then do a purge, all once more. resend in DXF format. if all else fails, then the problem is the customer's autocad system. is it imperative that customer receives an autocad native format? you can also send DWF files so they can at least view/print the cad file.

one last resort, you can also send an iges file. typically, it's only used for translating 3D data models but can potentially be used on 2D plans as well.

igesout (export)
igesin (import)

hope this helps & good luck!

best regards,
-JB