About Creating Polar Arrays (VBA/ActiveX)

You can array all drawing objects to fill a circular pattern.

To create a polar array, use the ArrayPolar method provided for that object. This method requires you to provide the number of objects to create, the angle-to-fill, and the center point for the array. The number of objects must be a positive integer greater than 1. The angle-to-fill must be in radians. A positive value specifies counterclockwise rotation. A negative value specifies clockwise rotation. An error is returned for an angle that equals 0. The center point is a variant array containing three doubles. These doubles represent the 3D WCS coordinate specifying the center point for the polar array.

AutoCAD determines the distance from the array's center point to a reference point on the original object. The reference point used depends on the type of object. AutoCAD uses the center point of a circle or arc, the insertion point of a block or shape, the start point of text, and one endpoint of a line or trace.

This method does not support the Rotate While Copying option of the AutoCAD ARRAY command.

Create a polar array

This example creates a circle, and then performs a polar array of the circle. This creates four circles filling 180 degrees around a base point of (4, 4, 0).

Sub Ch4_ArrayingACircle()
  ' Create the circle
  Dim circleObj As AcadCircle
  Dim center(0 To 2) As Double
  Dim radius As Double
  center(0) = 2#: center(1) = 2#: center(2) = 0#
  radius = 1
  Set circleObj = ThisDrawing.ModelSpace.AddCircle(center, radius)
  ZoomAll

  ' Define the polar array
  Dim noOfObjects As Integer
  Dim angleToFill As Double
  Dim basePnt(0 To 2) As Double
  noOfObjects = 4
  angleToFill = 3.14          ' 180 degrees
  basePnt(0) = 4#: basePnt(1) = 4#: basePnt(2) = 0#

  ' The following example will create 4 copies
  ' of an object by rotating and copying it about
  ' the point (3,3,0).
  Dim retObj As Variant
  retObj = circleObj.ArrayPolar(noOfObjects, angleToFill, basePnt)

  ZoomAll
End Sub