The drawing toolbar's Flip Horizontal command changes nothing on a library symbol. The flip that works sits on the symbol's Options tab in the symbol factory window: tick Flip Horizontal there. Rotation cannot replace it, because these symbols turn in 90-degree steps and a 180-degree turn leaves the artwork upside down.
Flip Horizontal on the drawing toolbar does nothing to a symbol that came from the symbol library. The flip that works is a check box on the symbol's Options tab, in the symbol factory window. Tick it and a right-facing blower points left, with its footprint and position on the screen unchanged. Rotation will not stand in for it, as the worked example below shows. A blower facing away from its duct on a shop-floor screen reads as a piping error at a glance, so fix the symbol before the board teaches operators the wrong layout.
Why the toolbar command does nothing
The Draw, Rotate or Flip menu and its Flip Horizontal entry serve drawing objects: the shapes, lines and pictures you place directly on the screen and edit on the canvas. Run the command on one of those and it flips. Run it on a symbol inserted from the library and nothing changes, however many times you repeat it. The orientation of a library symbol belongs to the symbol's own configuration in the symbol factory window, and that is where this editor changes it. If you are still choosing the artwork, selecting symbols from a bitmap control covers the browsing side of the same window.
Symptoms and what each points to
Each symptom below has one cause, and the cause names the fix.
- Flip Horizontal runs, the symbol stays right-facing. The selection is a library symbol. Its mirror lives on the Options tab in the symbol factory window.
- The same command flips a rectangle you drew on the same screen. That confirms the split: toolbar for drawing objects, Options tab for library symbols.
- The symbol points left now, but the artwork is upside down. A rotation was applied. Undo it and use the flip.
- The Options tab shows no flip setting. The selection is a drawing object or another object type. Use the toolbar transform for it.
Set the flip on the Options tab
- Open the symbol factory window and select the blower symbol.
- Open the Options tab for that symbol.
- Tick the Flip Horizontal check box.
- Read the direction off an asymmetric feature: the outlet points left, the motor housing moves to the top-left.
- Save the project, then open every screen that uses the symbol and check it at its final size.
A mirror is not a rotation
Rotation turns artwork and keeps its handedness. A mirror reverses handedness. For a blower that points right with its housing on top, a 180-degree rotation points it left with the housing on the bottom: upside down. The horizontal flip points it left with the housing still on top. The editor's documentation limits these symbols to rotations in 90-degree increments, 0, 90, 180 and 270 degrees. That is why the flip exists as its own setting: it is the only transform that gives a left-facing, upright result from right-facing artwork.
Example: the right-facing blower
An 800 x 600 andon screen carries a static bitmap blower: artwork of 128 x 128 pixels, placed at 96 x 96 pixels beside a duct that leaves the frame on the left. The blower points right. Selecting it and running Draw, Rotate or Flip, then Flip Horizontal, changes nothing. Open the symbol factory window, select the blower, open its Options tab, tick Flip Horizontal. The outlet now points left and the housing moves from the top-right to the top-left. The footprint is unchanged, 96 x 96 pixels in the same position, because a mirror swaps columns and keeps width and height. Setting rotation to 180 degrees instead would have pointed the outlet left with the housing at the bottom-left, upside down. Save, then check the screen at full size on the operator display.
Other editors handle it differently
This editor configures the symbol inside the symbol factory window. Another common style configures a symbol only after you drop it on the panel, through the placed symbol's property pages. Packages built on bitmap artwork keep the same choice somewhere in the symbol settings; configuring bitmap symbols for plant visualization shows where one platform puts it. If the library has no artwork that suits the machine even after the flip, draw the overlay yourself: turning a CAD drawing into a clean HMI bitmap overlay keeps linework crisp at panel scale.
Check the result before you call it done
Confirm direction with an asymmetric feature, the outlet or the housing, on the placed copy and on the operator display. Compare the footprint before and after: width and height in pixels stay equal. Walk the other screens that use the same symbol, since a configuration window is where the whole symbol, and every screen it feeds, gets its orientation. Once the blower faces the duct, animating a fan symbol from a discrete tag can tie the picture to the run state.
Recommendation: stop repeating Draw, Rotate or Flip, Flip Horizontal on a library symbol. Open the symbol's Options tab in the symbol factory window and tick Flip Horizontal there. Use the toolbar command for objects you drew yourself, and use a 90-degree rotation only when you want the artwork turned with its handedness kept.
Questions
Does flipping the symbol change the bitmap file?
No. The Flip Horizontal check box is a setting on the symbol, so the fix needs no image editing and no replacement artwork. Pixel geometry is untouched: a horizontal mirror keeps width and height, so a 128 x 128 pixel source stays 128 x 128 with its columns read in reverse order.
Can rotation produce the same left-facing symbol?
No. Rotation keeps handedness and bitmap symbols turn in 90-degree steps, 0, 90, 180 and 270; texture symbols share the same limit. A 180-degree turn points a right-facing blower left but upside down, with the motor housing at the bottom. The mirror is the only transform that swaps left and right and leaves top and bottom alone.
What if my editor has no symbol factory window?
Editors differ. Some expose a Mirror list on the symbol settings with an X or Y axis choice and a No Mirror default, and some configure the flip only after you drop the symbol on the panel. Look in the symbol's own property panel for the words mirror or flip before you redraw the graphic.
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