Custom brush spacing issue in Illustrator

[tturtles]

I have a brush tile that I cannot get to space correctly when I make a pattern brush in Illustrator. I have an invisible rectangle behind it, like I always make for brush objects that need a specified spacing. But for some reason, it is not working for this tile. I have 2 different versions of the tile in the attached file. I have tried:

• to make the tiles w/out the clipping mask
• to eliminate all but the bare minimum of objects outside of the clipping area
• different combinations of group/upgroup
• putting the tile into a different document in case there was a bug in the document
• eliminating individual objects from the clipping area (it never worked, even with just one object extending outside the rectangle)
• I tried making a brush tile with JUST the two rectangles from the top and bottom of "brush tile 2". Even those 2 rectangle won't clip to the invisible rectangle.
• BUT any other brush tiles that I make work fine.

Can anyone tell me what I've done wrong? Thank you!

[Monika Gause · Accepted solution]

Something is wrong with your invisible rectangle. I don't have any idea what it is. I drew a new rectangle and then deleted the old one.

One thing is for sure: the invisible rectangle should not be inside a group with the artwork.

Some other things (that you can watch out for, but do not apply to your current artwork)

- there mustn't be a brush applied to the rectangle

- it must be a precise rectangle (no rotation or such like)

[tturtles]

That solved it. Thanks! I had built the tiles horizontally and rotated them into the vertical position. I had no idea that the invisible rectangle couldn't be rotated. I'll remember that.