Issues with using Corridor Extents as Surface Boundary

While teaching recently a Civil 3D 2013 class we came upon an interesting dilemma with Corridor Surfaces.  When trying to constrain a Corridor surface using the corridor itself is now always presented as an option by default.  It may not always be to our advantage.

The issue is evident when the a subbase extends further out than the proposed TOP surface.  When trying to constrain the proposed TOP surface with the Corridor Extents, the surface will go further out than the Daylight.

The fix here is to constrain the surface using Add Automatically using Daylight or Add From a Polygon.

Help missing from Hydraflow Hydrographs

Today, one my clients was trying to look up some information for Hydrographs in the help content, but there was a problem, nothing happened.  Typically when selecting content from this program or any of the various Autodesk products, the user's guide pops up with content, index, and search options for the specific software.

After spending some time searching for a solution, I simply went back to an older version, in this case Civil 3D 2012, copied the following file, and overwrote the same one in Civil 3D 2013.

C:\ProgramFiles\Autodesk\AutoCAD Civil 3D 2012\HHApps\Hydrographs.chm

The hep content now works as expected.  The file in 2013 must be corrupt.  If you do not have access to a previous version of the software, please let me know and I would be happy to send the file.

Adding Labels to Specific Links within a Code Set Style

From time to time, we may want Civil 3D label certain subassemblies within our corridor model.  The problem with the Top or Default code is that we get those links we want labeled, plus many others.  As you can see from the image below, this isn't what we want.

In order to get around this, we can go into our code set style and add some additional link codes that we will assign to just the links we wish to label.

Once we are editing the code set style, we can right click on links, and hit add.  Here we can add a link code for such things as foreslope, ditch, etc.  These additional codes will allow us to specifically assign them to certain links.  After selecting add, it will ask for the link style witch isn't important.

After selecting the link style, you will notice that it makes a new link code named new code.  We can rename this to Ditch, or whatever additional feature we wish to label.  Here we can also assign an appropriate label style to label elevation, slope, or whatever data we wish to convey.

The following screen capture depicts what the new code set style should look like after creating the additional codes with an appropriate label style.

Now that we have created the two additional link codes, we can go into the subassembly properties of the two individual links.

From the parameters tab, we simply go to the link codes, put in a coma, and add the appropriate code we just created, in this instance we would add ditch.  It is important that we spell the code to match exactly with the code created, upper or lower case does matter.

We can do the same for the foreslope as well.  Here is what the subassemblies look like.

This process will save time on labeling, and these styles can ultimately be added to the corporate template for  others to use.

Assemblies: Look Wrong but Build Right

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, I hope I can prepare you when it happens to you.

When laying out Assemblies sometimes the overall look can wrong, some subassemblies will even include a label “Layout Mode” to let you know that when processed in a corridor will look right.

Assemblies are building blocks to build a corridor, and are NOT intended to be plotted, we have Standard Details Sheets for that. . I’ve notice this behavior in the Generic Link to Marked Point and some Medians.

Looking at a MEDIAN assembly, this one is closing the gap from Left to Right hooking to the MarkedPoint (triangle), with positive grades crowning upward.

When built in the corridor and placed in the cross section, the positive grades.

Now using the same subassembly on the other side of the median, closing the gap from Right to Left. This time we will hooked to the MarkedPoint (triangle) will cause the subassembly to flip.

Because the median subassembly had to flip to connect, the original positive grades are now inverted too.

Why isn't my pipe round?

Have you ever tried to show a pipe crossing in profile view or section view and it looks like the following:

As you can see from the screen capture, it looks more like a hex nut  rather than a pipe.  The cause of this is a system variable called FACETDEV.  The default value for the variable is set to .5 feet.  This variable works very similar to how the mid ordinate distance does for contours.  Civil 3D is drawing small line segments to represent the circular pipe.  If you change the variable to say .01, you end up with what you see below.

This is probably what most of you would expect to see.  I would like to point out that this variable will hold if changed in your corporate template, meaning you should only need to change this once.  Lastly, you may notice some drawing performance depending on how low you set the value, so you may need to play with it to get the right balance between performance and display.   

Template Tricks

I was recently asked by a IT manager if I have any creative tricks for stream ling the template creation process. In this blog, I will go over two such techniques I use.   The first technique I will go over is getting the object layers assigned in the template.  Typically, I chose to make all of the objects layer with a C3D- prefix, unless the client has some predefined ones.  So an example of this would be C3D-Alignment.  Now, rather than type each one, we can open a drawing/template with all those objects layers all ready assigned, like the one shown below.

Now with the blank template as the current drawing, I only need to edit the drawing settings of the other template/drawing that has the object layers assigned.  I then select the object layers tab and simply hit OK.

As you can see from the screen capture below, the object layers have been transferred to the blank template.  

The second trick I like to use is to have three predefined pipe networks all ready created within the template, which you can see in the following screen capture.

It is important to note that these networks are networks in name only, and they don't currently contain pipes or structures.  Now what they do contain are object layers, like you can see in the capture below.

By having the networks predefined, the user doesn't have to set these layers when they start the pipe network creation process.  All the user needs to do is edit the appropriate network, and start laying out pipe.

Intersecting SURFACE Boundaries

Some time ago... a day, a week, a month, who knows, I wanted to compare 2 TIN Surfaces and figure out the EXACT location of where the Surfaces touched. Ended up coming up with these steps: 

         1. Create a TIN Volume Surface 

         2. Ran am Analysis to User Contour Elevation 0

         3. Then Extract the Created User Contour as a Line 

Start by Creating a New TIN Volume Surface

(in this example a POND will be compared against a CROSSING plane) 

The Volume Surface is calculated from elevation 0, it will appears below the TIN Surfaces. 

To simplify view set TIN surfaces to No Display, and leave VOLUME Surface on

The Volume Surface is shown here using a Tin & Points Style. Notice how the Pond hole is filled up. A Surface Analysis to a User Specified Contour needs to be done to find the intersecting boundary.

Before running the Analysis, make sure the User Contour component is visible in the used surface style. The color has been changed to RED for it to stand out in Plan View

Then the VOLUME Surface Properties dialog box to the Analyses Tab, Select User-defined Contours as the Type. Presses on the Range to 1 and In the Range Detail area set the Elevation value in the row to 0.00

The result should be a POLYLINE marking the location of where the 2 Surfaces intersect.

The resulting Boundary Outline can be extracted. By selecting the surface and going to the Contextual Ribbon. From the Tools Panel use the Extract Objects and Uncheck everything except User Contours.

The final product is a 2D AutoCAD Polyline, that can be selected and edited.