How to push an abline grid to the background in a plot?

Question

I'm trying to plot a grid for a time series plot using abline(). It works fine, but I'm not able to draw the grid lines in the background: they are above the time series line.

I'm using the following code:

options(repr.plot.width=15, repr.plot.height=10)
par(cex=1.5)

plot(Serie_PIB_NO_ajustados_hasta_2018,
    xlab="Tiempo", #Título de los ejes
    ylab="Miles de millones de €", 
    main="PIB pm Demanda España (datos no ajustados de estacionalidad y calendario)",
    col="blue",
    lwd = 3,
    xlim = c(1995, 2020),
    ylim = c(0, 350),
    xaxp = c(1995, 2019, 8)) 

lines(Serie_PIB_NO_ajustados_2019,
      col="green", lwd=3)

abline(h = c(0, 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300, 350), col = "grey")
abline(v = c(1995, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019), col = "grey")

To get this graph: (You could see that the grid lines are above the time series lines).

I've tried to solve the problem using panel.first and tck options, as suggested in several related questions. But they don't work for me.

Data may be downloaded from this link.

Does this answer your question? [How do I draw gridlines using abline() that are behind the data?](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/7263743/how-do-i-draw-gridlines-using-abline-that-are-behind-the-data). There are more options than using `panel.first`. If it doesn't work, please update your answer with some data. — harre, Jul 13 '22 at 18:18
@rawr it's a `ts` object. I've created it using `ts()` function. — AlejandroDGR, Jul 13 '22 at 18:20
@harre I've already tried that solution, but `panel.first` seems to not work in my case. — AlejandroDGR, Jul 13 '22 at 18:21
`plot(ts(1:5), panel.first = grid())` works so theres not much we can do for you without other details — rawr, Jul 13 '22 at 18:23
@harre I'd rather using `abline()` because `grid()` has problem with adjusting the vertical lines to a time series plot ticks. — AlejandroDGR, Jul 13 '22 at 18:23
Please post some data according to https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5963269/how-to-make-a-great-r-reproducible-example and explain more in depth what you have tried. — harre, Jul 13 '22 at 18:24
With base graphics, elements are added in the sequence of the commands. Use a `plot(NA, ...)` command to set up the plot, but not add any lines. Then use the `abline()` (it can take both h= and v= in a single call), then add the two sets of lines with two `lines()` calls. — dcarlson, Jul 14 '22 at 03:43
@dcarlson Ooohhh this is totally correct. Thanks a lot! You should post it as an answer. — AlejandroDGR, Jul 14 '22 at 10:31

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 14 '22 at 18:00

This should work:

plot(NA, xlab="Tiempo", #Título de los ejes
    ylab="Miles de millones de €", 
    main="PIB pm Demanda España (datos no ajustados de estacionalidad y calendario)",
    xlim = c(1995, 2020),
    ylim = c(0, 350),
    xaxp = c(1995, 2019, 8)) 

abline(h = c(0, 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300, 350), col = "grey")
abline(v = c(1995, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019), col = "grey") 

lines(Serie_PIB_NO_ajustados_hasta_2018, col="blue", lwd = 3)
lines(Serie_PIB_NO_ajustados_2019, col="green", lwd=3)

How to push an abline grid to the background in a plot?

1 Answers1