Volume Dashboard Extension for 2012

A few months ago, Autodesk released the Volume Dashboard Extension for subscription customers.  The volume dashboard is a more compact way of tracking multiple volume surfaces, bounded volumes, and finally generating reports within or outside of the drawing.

You should now see the dashboard under the extension manager.

After you right click and select execute, the new volume dashboard should appear.

The new dashboard allows you to keep track of all the volume surfaces created.  The boundary option is similar to the bounded volume tool that currently exists in the software.  As seen in the capture below, the dashboard boundary allows for tracking bounded areas within a given volume surface.

Finally, the dashboard allows for creating a volume report, or inserting a table into Civil 3D respectively.

Users will be now be able to calculate, report and visualize surface volumes very quickly and all in one location.

Added Data Band Labels Along Vertical Curves at Incremental Distances

Over the last two weeks, I have had two separate clients ask if there was a way to add additional labels in the profile data band where a vertical curve is present.  Also, besides adding labels, they would also like them at a given increment such as 25 feet.

After giving this question some thought, I arrived at two possible solutions.  The first solution is to create an additional data band below the profile view at the appropriate increment.

The new data band will be similar to the other with the exception of the dragged state being set to as composed.  Also, you will need to add a line component to the data band so as to mimic the line that currently separates the existing and proposed elevation.

As you can see from the screen capture above,  the new data band allows for dragging the label. 

Finally, we can drag the labels that we need from the extra data band from below into the data band in the profile view.  The second solution is to create a profile view label that extracts both the existing and proposed elevation at a given station value.

As seen in the screen capture above, the profile view label is meant to mimic the data band labels.  It is important to note that the profile view label seen above is created from two reference text labels and a line component.  The reason for the reference text is to hold the existing and proposed elevation at a given station despite dragging it up or down in the profile view.  A normal profile view label will change elevation as it is moved about the view.

Project Silverstar

Autodesk Labs has come up with a preview technology called Project Silverstar.  Silverstar uses optimization techniques to design a layout or finished ground  profile with respect to earthwork costs.

Upon downloading the application, it will be added to the toolbox under Technology previews.

Upon executing profile optimization, you will be asked to log into your individual Autodesk account.  The reason for the log in is to email you the solution that is being derived by the application.

After logging in, you will then be prompted to select the appropriate alignment that you would like a profile designed for.  Notice in the upper right the email address, this is why the log in information is requested from the previous screen capture.

You will also be given access to a cost table to assign appropriate costs associated with earthwork.

Once you select the appropriate alignment and corresponding surface, you will proceed to the borrow/waste option.  This is where we can define station to include a borrow or dump location similar to that of a Mass Haul diagram. 

The next screen allows the user to define minimum and maximum grades that will be permitted, along with allowable tangent lengths.

Finally, the optimization table allows the user to control the intensity of PVI's, along with solution precision and time.  It should be noted that the more profile options selected and other precisions chosen will determine the time frame to process the profile and email an optimization profile.

After finishing the wizard, you will then be sent an email containing the following information.

The pdf report will contain the optimization determined by Silverstar from the information provided as seen below.

Finally, the text and xml provided can be used in Civil 3D to generate the profile created in the optimization report.

Corridor Solids

Autodesk Labs has come out with an extension for creating corridor solids from Civil 3D subassemblies.  The extension allows for creating solids that can be used for better visual renderings, class detection, and coordination between various team members using various Autodesk applications.

After downloading the extension, you will see that it has been added to the Toolbox residing on Toolspace.

Upon executing the command, you will get the following pop up box.

The options in the box are simple to follow. We simply need to select the corridor we wish to generate solids for.  We can also assign layers to our subassembly shapes.

The final box allows us to generate the solids in our current drawing or in a new one.

Here is the output generate by the extension in plan view.

Finally in plan view.  Now it is available for a variety of uses.

Caice Extension for Civil 3D 2012

For those of you who use Caice or have data in a Caice format, Autodesk has created an extension for bringing Caice data into AutoCAD Civil 3D 2012.  The following is from the support - utilities and drivers section of Civil 3D on the  Autodesk website  As always, be sure to download the proper version for your operating system.

Upon installing the extension, you will get some additional Caice tools added on the Toolbox tab of Prospector as seen below.

Civil 3D 2012 Bid Express Extension

Autodesk has released a new extension for those users who do work for a department of transportation.  The bid express extension allows us to use the functionality of QTO and ultimately tie it to pricing and establish cost estimations. 

Once you have downloaded and installed the proper executable file, you will see the following  options listed under miscellaneous utilities on the Toolbox tab.

The first option under the extension is subscribing to a web service.  The first thing I will mention about this is that you only need to sign up to get access to the pay item and report pricing with an email address and password.  Currently the service is being provided to users at no cost, even though it asks for billing information when continuing with an activation email.

Upon setting up your account, you will then select get pay items and execute where you will enter your user name a password.

After logging into Info Tech's service, you will be presented with a list of pay item files available for download, similar to the one seen below.

Once you have selected the appropriate pay item file, you can then use QTO to assign the pay items to your Civil 3D and AutoCAD objects as needed.  Finally, when you are read to generate a takeoff report, you will select the produce price report.

Give the appropriate name for you bid report and select go.

Notice that your report is taking form, but you must select get price report to finish it.  You will most likely need to log in again to the get the price to update as seen below.

Finally, we can either create a report or have it create a table in Civil 3D.

Creating a Box Around Structure Labels

Today I was asked by a client if there was a way to show a box around all of the  structure information in plan and profile view as seen below. 

In the label style composer, you can turn on a box for a given component, but there is no simple way of turning on or off a box that encompasses all of your structure information.  The reason that we can't make one label is because of the text for each component that has to be added to generate invert information.  The approach that I took to create the above label was to add the structure name component to the top and bottom of the label, with the bottom copy display set to false.  I then attached a line component to the top of both of the structure name components in the top left and top right to get the proper length of the line.   This generates the top and bottom of the box.

As shown above, I finally create the box by adding two more line components.  Line 3 is determined by selecting the start anchor point to be the start of line 1and the end anchor point is set to the start of line 2.  Conversely, line 4 is created by doing the same process except choosing the anchor point to be the ends of lines 1 and 2 respectively.   We have essentially created a box from four lines.  The one caveat that we must take into consideration, is if the invert information is longer than that of the structure information, we will have text outside of the box since the lengths of lines  1 and 2 are determined by the structure name length.