Advanced HLR

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Connect drawing detail with its 3D source

During a drawing review, users need to know which part a line belongs to. Advanced HLR keeps that connection available as CAD geometry becomes a 2D view. Users can select a line, find its source in 3D, and see information attached to that part or feature.

Build drawing tools that help people understand a design, find details, and act on engineering information.

How it works

Hidden line removal, or HLR, starts with a 3D model and a viewing direction. It creates projected curves and separates visible detail from hidden detail. Source links connect curves back to the edges and faces that produced them. Your application can use these links for selection, highlighting, and part information.

Bring part information into a drawing

Use source links to carry names, colors, inspection results, or manufacturing attributes into your drawing workflow. A service team could select an outline to find a spare part. A reviewer could highlight an edge and inspect its related geometry.

Your application chooses which information to show and which action follows a selection.

Create outlines and hidden-line views

Generate visible lines, hidden detail, and external profiles for a chosen view. Use a clean silhouette for a product illustration or show hidden features during an engineering review.

External profiles also help with footprint comparison and layout preparation. Teams can compare shapes in a shared view and focus on areas that need attention.

Choose detail for each drawing

An external profile gives a product illustration a simple outline. Visible and hidden lines provide more detail for an engineering drawing. These options let teams choose how much information a view should contain.

Small openings, tangent edges, and overlapping parts can make a drawing difficult to read. View direction and line display should make these features clear. Keeping units and scale with a view also helps teams use it correctly in a report or another drawing tool.

Keep service illustrations connected to part records

A service catalog often starts with an assembly model, yet its users work from a simple drawing. If part references are added by hand, a revised illustration creates another round of checking: which outline belongs to which component, and does each reference still point to the right item?

Source-linked projection gives your application a way to rebuild that connection from model geometry. It can generate the required view and use source associations to connect drawing curves with available part identifiers. Selecting an outline could then open a part record or highlight the component in 3D.

Your application manages catalog entries, revision checks, and publication. HLR supplies projected geometry and its source relationships. Together, these steps can reduce manual matching during documentation updates and help service teams identify the item they need from a familiar 2D view.

Build views for people who use them

• Technical documentation: prepare clear illustrations with links to part information.
• Design review: move between 2D detail and 3D geometry during a discussion.
• Manufacturing preparation: connect projected features with their engineering attributes.

Pair HLR with PMI View for manufacturing annotations, or Shape Healing & Validation for model preparation. Show us your drawing workflow and the interactions you want to build.